Potential
by Electric Smile
Summary: Companion piece to Kinetic. Vega finds himself in a world where he never joined Shadaloo. Where his mother was never murdered. Where he's been romantically involved with his most hated rival for five years. As he digs deeper into the differences between the real world and this one, will he be able to find his way home? Or will he come to find he has no reason to want to leave?
1. Chapter 1

_"Our lives are not our own. We are bound to others, past and present, and by each crime and every kindness, we birth our future."  
-An Orison of Sonmi-451, Cloud Atlas, by David Mitchell_

It was warm. Maybe he'd been a little dazed. How long had he been in the shower? He opened his eyes, pushing away from the cool tiles of the wall and turning off the hot water. Long enough. He reached for his towel, and started to dry his hair. He stopped, hands holding the towel on his hair frozen in place. He let the towel fall loosely to his shoulders, and touched his hair himself with his bare hands. Short. It was much shorter, and shaggy and when had he done that? No, no, that wasn't his decision. Someone else had done this, surely, and he clenched his jaw, trying to figure out who would dare to do something like this.

He stepped towards the sink in the foggy bathroom, and wiped the steam from the mirror. That was when he realized this wasn't his bathroom. How it had taken him so long seemed strange to him in retrospect. His shower didn't look like that. His sink was supposed to be on the other side of the room. He studied himself in the mirror. His hair didn't look like it'd been randomly chopped off by some soon-to-be-dead prankster. It was purposeful and professional. He hadn't done this though, had he? He sighed, getting impatient. He felt right, but not right, and it was terribly uncomfortable. He looked down at the sink. Two toothbrushes sat side by side. Two. He pulled open the drawers. Just assorted bathroom tools like nail clippers and-wait, nail files? Those weren't his. He pulled open another. Little bottles of brightly colored nail polish clinked and clattered as they rolled around in the drawer. Definitely not his. Third drawer. Feminine products. He slammed it shut again, muttering a curse out loud. Whose house was he in? Why was he in it? And when had he cut his damned hair?

The mystery couldn't be solved from the bathroom. He finished drying himself off and got dressed. The clothes weren't familiar, but nor were they something he wouldn't normally wear. That led him to believe he'd chosen them, at least. And they fit, so surely they were his. He left the towel behind, raked at his hair with his fingers, then stepped into the hall.

Familiar, but not. This wasn't his place in Barcelona. The place had come painted in that cliche beachy shade of pale blue so often applied to oceanfront establishments. The walls were off white here. He padded silently down the hall. The walls were bare, no art or photos. He didn't hear anyone, but still tried his best to remain quiet. Letting out a sigh at his own paranoia, he remembered that he'd just been using the shower. So if anyone _was _here, they knew he was, too. There on the right was a room with several boxes. They were open, so he looked in. Some books about art, history, anatomy, aesthetics, design... He caught sight of an easel laying on the floor beside the stack of boxes. He moved the top box, and opened it. Knitting needles? Yarn? Crochet hooks? That was not likely to be anything he'd be interested in. Still unsure of his surroundings, he left the room.

The kitchen was quiet and empty. It was also littered with boxes. He didn't bother with them after seeing the first contained plates and cutlery. Not his, but still there was that strange feeling of it not being entirely unfamiliar. So he kept searching. He found a bedroom finally. Not his bed. Too many pillows and the blanket wasn't the plain solid-colored sort he preferred. All those pillows and paisley patterns were not something he would put in his home. There was no other furniture in the room, but more boxes. He saw a phone on the floor beside the bed. It was plugged into the nearby outlet. He sat beside it, unlocked it.

Again, familiar, and not. He looked through the text messages. Was this his phone? The person he'd been speaking with was labeled '_primavera_'. It didn't ring a bell, other than meaning 'spring' in Spanish. The conversation was in English, though, and fairly trivial. So he looked at the pictures instead. It'd tell him whose it was quicker, but naturally, there weren't any. Annoyed, he put the phone down, and headed over to the nearest pile of boxes. The one on top was small, and had only a few things. Keys, some cards, a bottle of pills. He picked up one of the cards and felt the color drain from his face. It was him, but the name didn't say Vega like it should have.

After his mother had died, he'd left Spain, claiming to himself that he was leaving for good. Destination assigned by the random placement of a finger on a spinning globe, he'd spent time in Japan, a little over a year, before going back on his word. But he'd only done it because he'd decided he was coming back as Vega, not the stupid and useless boy he'd been before he left. He had become someone capable, talented, and impressive and he'd make damn sure well that all of Spain learned that some way or another. He wanted to forget Andrés, to leave behind any notion of weakness and vulnerability.

So how could he do that while holding a current identification card bearing that old name? It would expire in five years. Why did he have this? He looked at the other cards. A debit card, a credit card, both with the would-be forgotten name. There was a slip of paper with an address written on it in his handwriting. Someplace in America. Chicago. He glanced at the bottle of medicine. It had his name on it, too. An antipsychotic. He dropped it like it was suddenly on fire and stepped away, running a hand through his hair. His terribly shorter than ever hair. A horrible anxiousness was beginning to make his stomach turn. What was going on? Why did everything seem foreign but right all at once?

He stepped back over to the phone and opened the contacts. This was his phone, he knew it was. He held it for a second, unsure what he was planning to do with it. Then he decided, and searched for Bison's number. It wasn't there. Nor Sagat. Nor Balrog. Nor anyone else affiliated with Shadaloo whom he was ever required to keep in contact with. He groaned like he was going to be sick, and scrolled through every name one by one, cursing his habit of assigning nicknames to people. Where was Cammy in this list? Where were all of the numbers associated with his job as a bullfighter? Frustrated, he put the phone down again.

He didn't live here alone. This was evident in all of the feminine things he'd found throughout the place. So where was his room mate? Girlfriend? He wrinkled his nose. Wife? He shook his head at that. No, he didn't keep steady relationships. Too risky, too much of a hassle being concerned with somebody else. All it ever got you in the end was trouble, anyway, so what was the point?

The rest of the home was empty. It was small, not a house, definitely. Maybe an apartment or something. He-or someone-was in the process of moving in here. Why? And where? He leaned against the counter as he tried to consider the possible answers. Maybe he had helped someone move here. In his very fastidious attempt to conceal his secret identity, he'd rid his phone of any traces of all things Shadaloo related, like the missing phone numbers. He felt a bit of hope, and then it was dashed as quickly as it'd come. The fact of the matter remained that his real name-his birth name-was on the cards in that bedroom, and that bottle of pills, and none of them were old and expired items.

A quick movement and small noise made him jump back. A small tabby cat had jumped up onto the counter he'd been leaning on. It meowed at him, stepping forward. "I didn't know you were here," he mumbled, mostly to himself to justify why he'd been startled by a cat. It looked at him expectantly. He didn't really like animals. Cats were better than dogs, at least, but he still couldn't understand why someone wanted to deal with cleaning up after and keeping up with another living thing. Especially an animal. The cat drew his attention to the sink as it passed by, carefully avoiding getting its feet wet. There was a mug and a spoon. A very pink mug. It was going to drive him mad, trying to figure out whose house he was in, or why. But the mug in the sink reminded him at least, that some morning rituals couldn't go ignored, no matter how unusual the situation.

There wasn't much coffee in the pot on the opposite counter. Just a bit more than enough for one person. He opened a few cabinets, eventually finding a cup. The coffee was still warm, at least. He could feel it through the thin plastic of the blue cup. He wasn't sure where that mug in the sink had come from or where to find another, but it wasn't that important. He just had to drink it, and maybe it would help him think a little more clearly. He paced around the room, the kitchen more or less sharing one big open space with a living room that was, of course, crowded with boxes. How was there this much stuff to be dealt with? The cat trailed after him as he made laps around the room. "I don't know what you want _me _to do," he muttered irritably at the thing. He paused by a window, separating the blinds with two fingers and peeking out. A busy street in an urban area. Maybe ten or so floors up. He didn't look much longer, turning away and heading back to the kitchen. He emptied the cup, and put it in the sink.

He turned around, facing the quietly humming refrigerator and it all hit him like a ton of bricks. And all it took was one picture. One stupid, glossy, four by six piece of colored paper. He stared, and it just wasn't processing properly for a minute. There was him, sort of a half-grin on his face. He was used to making this expression, smiling when he didn't really feel like it, but was humoring someone anyway. Everyone did it. But that wasn't the trouble. It was her. That woman. that _thing_ his arm was wrapped around, pulling close. She smiled brightly, doe-brown eyes looking right at the camera, and it made him want to vomit. He knew all at once who _primavera _was. His most hated rival, an animosity mutually agreed upon by both parties involved.

_Primavera _was spring, and spring was Chun-Li.

Almost as if on cue, he heard the distinct sound of a key grinding away in a lock. He froze. This wasn't right, this wasn't right. What was he supposed to do? Hide? That picture on the fridge he continued to stare at said it didn't make a difference, because she _kinda liked him_. "Ohhh, hi Cammy!" intoned a high, feminine voice. Like she was talking to a child. He turned to face her, stomach dropping at the thought of, not only being in an amorous relationship with her, but also the potential of having a child. There she was, but not with any child, her eyes instead directed at the tabby cat that had come to greet her at the door.

Then the cat's name was Cammy? He swallowed hard. How did actual, person-Cammy feel about that, he wondered? Dear God, who was he kidding, how did actual person-Cammy feel about Chun-Li _dating _him? He stared at her as she closed the door, a grocery bag in one arm. She bent to pet the cat, then approached the kitchen and he thought about bolting but where was the fun in that? She glanced up at him as she set the bag down. "I really am not looking forward to unpacking all of this stuff," she said.

"It's only one bag," he replied dryly, not really wanting to speak with her. Why wasn't she trying to arrest him?

She smiled and rolled her eyes at him. "Oh, ha ha. I wish. But I'd _really _prefer it if everything in this area, at least, were put up before my dad gets here later this week. I want the place to be _sort _of presentable, you know?"

He almost choked on his own saliva. Her dad? Her dead-for-almost-a-decade dad? "Your dad," he echoed. Why was he talking to her? Why wasn't he running? This was a trap. It had to be. Or something.

"Hellooo? Earth to Andrés! Drink more coffee," she said, waving a hand. That time he did choke a bit, coughing, seeming to break his own trance. Or maybe it'd been hearing her call him by that name, and in such a friendly way. He was supposed to be Vega, somebody she feared and loathed. Not a domesticated guy she flirted with cheerily.

"Doesn't the name 'Vega' mean anything to you?" he asked suddenly plainly irritated at her obliviousness. She didn't seem to notice as she continued to pull food from the bag. Rice. Bread. Fruit. Her lips came together into a tight circle as she thought.

"Mmm, I think it might be the name of a star? And it's a surname, that I know," she said. "Why?"

"What about Shadaloo?" he pressed further. He felt like he shouldn't be asking her this. What if he was outing himself by asking? But she seemed genuine. She was a lot of things, but generally not a good actor, from what he had gathered from previous interaction with her. There was no resentment in her eyes or voice. Nothing hidden, and she, like him, was too proud to suppress a disgust as primal as the one she felt for him.

"Come on, now you're just being silly," she sighed. "I _know_ who they are." There was a sudden tight feeling in his chest. Here it was, this was it. "That's the whole reason my dad quit Interpol. They threatened to kill him. So he resigned. And I'm happy he did, no matter if he wonders if it was a good decision or not."

He let out the breath he'd been holding, forcing it to remain even and quiet. Was this a dream? Her father was alive, and no longer an Interpol detective. And her? What did she do? Was she a detective? What was the best way to figure that out without outright asking? If he really was dating her-or whatever this arrangement was-shouldn't he know? He wanted to laugh. Since when did he care about hurting her feelings? "And you aren't one either?" he ventured.

"No," she said, stretching the 'o' sound. "I don't think I'd ever go for something like that. Too dangerous. I like helping people, but there's better ways to do it than challenging terrorists and murderers and stuff."

Was it real? He kept watching her cautiously as she put away the groceries she'd bought. Did it do him any good to contest her for now? He tried to calculate the risks of playing along. It could be some kind of a trap. After all, he couldn't remember how he got here. He remembered the warmth of the shower, opening his eyes with his head resting against the tiles. Before that...

Nothing came to mind. If it was an elaborate ruse, what was it for? She seemed to already have figured out his name. If she'd dug up that much, what else did she have on him? Or was that the point, to get him so confused by the situation that he'd blurt something out? Something incriminating, like asking her about Shadaloo?

No. He glanced at the picture on the fridge, and just couldn't bring himself to think that it was somehow doctored. He hadn't had short hair since he was young, and he'd never been to China in his youth. And he didn't look young in the photo anyway. There were surely better ways than this one to try to out him. But if that wasn't what was going on, he was still at a loss. Maybe he was dreaming. Or was this what a coma was like? Not that he had reason to believe something had happened that landed him in such a dire situation as that, but at this point he was grasping at anything.

"Why did you name the cat that?" he asked abruptly. She leaned away from the cabinet so she could make eye contact with him.

"Um...that was you," she reminded him. "You were calling her that before we even got her to come inside, remember?"

He looked at the orange cat. He named it after Cammy. Why would he do that? "What does Cammy think?" he asked. He waved a hand. "I mean English Cammy."

Chun-Li's eyebrows rose up a bit. "Who is that?"

"Cammy White?" he clarified. "You two are practically best friends." He couldn't keep the hint of resentment from creeping into his voice.

She seemed concerned, and took a few steps towards him. He tensed. She wasn't going to catch him by surprise, that much was certain. "I don't know anyone by that name," she said. "Are you feeling alright? You seem sort of uneasy."

"Yes," he answered.

"You remembered to take your medicine?"

Medicine? He clenched his jaw as he remembered that little bottle of antipsychotics. He wasn't psychotic. He didn't need that. But if he said that, she probably wouldn't agree. It was just another problem to add to the pile. "Yes," he said. How was she going to prove otherwise?

"Okay. But no, I don't know anyone named Cammy."

That struck him as odd. The two were like a united front against Bison and Shadaloo. But if Chun-Li was truly no longer with Interpol-or, allegedly, had never been an officer to begin with-then he supposed she would never meet Cammy in her line of work. This was going to be a lot to keep track of. Or would it? What was making him obligated to be here? People break up all the time, and he certainly wasn't interested in a continued cohabitation with her, of all people.

Then he looked around at all of this _stuff. _His stuff, her stuff. How it was all together, that maddening photograph on the fridge. The way she held no contempt towards him. How he didn't even have anyone to call and ask what the hell was going on. And that, above all else, he was supposedly crazy enough to warrant medication. So who was going to take seriously a psychotic questioning the nature of his reality? All of these things combined made him hesitant to jump ship just yet. He needed to figure out what was going on, and running off into a world that he didn't quite feel familiar with wasn't likely to get him anywhere. He could try to approach the entire problem from a more methodical and logical stance than that. So he'd stay here, for now, and tolerate her as best as he could until he could figure out what was happening. He just had to hope she wouldn't make him want to strangle her before then.


	2. Chapter 2

_"Travel far enough, you meet yourself."_  
_-An Orison of Sonmi-451, Cloud Atlas_

He hadn't really slept well. For one, he was trying to accomplish doing so at the kitchen table. There was no couch in the place yet, and he didn't want to sleep beside her. There were too many risks to consider. If it really was all an act, she could subdue and arrest him easily while he was sleeping, and he wouldn't get the chance to react. Plus, the thought of laying beside her, quite frankly, was horrifically unappealing. He could tell her how beautiful she was all day long. But appreciating something for its beauty didn't necessarily mean he felt anything more than a superficial admiration. Very few people in his life gave him reason to truly admire them. She, on the other hand, had caused him an untold amount of grief from the first time they'd met. He wasn't about to get in bed and cuddle up with a woman who'd sent him sailing out of a New York City high rise to the unforgiving pavement a dozen or so stories below.

So sleeping in the kitchen was his next best option. A hotel room somewhere in the city was begrudgingly out of the question. Financially, he was nowhere near as well off as before. He'd never had much of an interest in money, and he now was realizing such an attitude could only come from having always had enough, for the most part. He would preserve what he had in the event of some emergency or another. If he really did suddenly need to disappear from this place, he wanted to be prepared.

It hadn't been comfortable. Resting his head on his arms was fine for a few minutes, but sleeping that way hadn't worked out for him. He'd woken up frequently, a combination of the awkward position, the cat jumping onto the table and bumping its head against his, and the unfamiliar noises of the apartment in the night. He couldn't ignore these noises until he was familiarized with them. When six in the morning finally rolled around, he got up. His back and shoulders were aching and sore, and no amount of coffee seemed to make the headache go away. Thirty minutes later, he heard something, some obnoxious music, and realized it was her alarm going off. She shuffled into the kitchen a few minutes later. Every sound annoyed him. Some plastic wrapper crinkling noisily, the sink spewing water into a bowl, the buttons on the microwave trilling loudly.

"Did you not make it to bed?" she asked. Not accusatory, but vaguely concerned. He shrugged. His back was to her, so he couldn't see how she'd responded. He didn't too much care. He winced as the microwave beeped loudly, the noise hitting him not unlike a baseball bat against his skull. He was halfway to finishing the coffee when the sound of _slurping_ reached his ears next. He turned his head, cup still held almost to where his mouth had been. She was eating noodles. He narrowed his eyes as the noise never seemed to stop.

"What are you eating?" he all but growled. She must've chalked it up to him having just woken up, because she didn't seem upset.

"Instant noodles, at least, until we have more groceries so I can make my own again," she responded. "'Oriental' flavor, whatever that's supposed to mean."

He narrowed his eyes. "That's disgusting."

"Well, they aren't as good as real noodles, no," she said. "But you can't expect much from instant anything."

"No," he clarified, as she seemed to miss the point. "Noodles are not breakfast."

She laughed. "This again? My typical imperialist westerner. You can quit critiquing my breakfasts, I'm not changing my menu."

His lips pulled back a bit in disgust. Breakfast was supposed to be something light, not a heaping mess of carbohydrates and sodium. Fruit, _maybe _some kind of bread item or an egg if he really needed it. If heavy meals like noodles were supposed to be breakfast to her, he hated to consider what dinner might mean. She slurped her way noisily through the rest of her meal and he stayed there as long as his blood pressure could handle it. That noise would find its way into his dreams, he was sure of it.

She left an hour or so later, leaving him alone. He briefly entertained the thought of trying to go to sleep again. The coffee he'd drank told him it was not going to work out for him. And he still had so many questions that needed answering. A cursory search of boxes in the bedroom revealed only clothing, towels, extra bedsheets. Shoes. An ungodly number of shoes. He sighed quietly, and tried the kitchen. The boxes were not helpful, and were starting to annoy him. He found places for the dishes, supposing it would make eating later a little easier if he knew where everything was. It took more time than he thought it would, and he was irritated to find he'd actually done the housework she'd requested. When he poked through the boxes in the living room, he decided he wasn't going to empty any of them. They were largely useless. More books, random novels, nick-nacks, blankets. He left them where they were, and headed to that spare room he'd investigated the day before.

He sat on the floor in the mostly empty room, an assortment of journals and sketchbooks splayed beside him. How fortunate it was that he, a man who couldn't figure out how his life had changed so radically over the space of a single shower, had such records to reflect on. It made nothing better for him, though, only serving to further his confusion. Sketchbooks held skeletal imagery of far-off projects he seemed to have planned. Ideas jotted here and there, taking note of color palettes and compositions. But one thing remained constant throughout all of these flighty notes and gestural lines-he saw her face. He was certain it was Cammy. The most recent drawing was from two days ago. _"__¿Quién? ¿Quién? ¿Quién?"_ he'd scribbled beside her steely visage, underlining the last word in frustration. Who, indeed. She seemed to accuse him with her graphite eyes, two thick, quick strokes each with a pair of angrily scrawled circles beneath. _Why don't you remember me? _she seemed to be asking. He didn't have an answer for his previous apparent lapse in memory. He knew her. So where was she now?

He put the book down, grabbing for one of the journals instead.

_"It has been requested that I do this every day. So I did. -18/03/09"_

The loose page fluttered as he sighed heavily. He was so helpful to himself. He flipped to the back, but the entry was still a few months old. _"I had a dream. There was a girl, she looked like this:" _Again, there was Cammy's face, but it seemed to him it had been drawn with less certainty. _"I've never seen her before, but she seemed important at the time, so I don't want to forget her. If I meet her one day, I'll let her know about this premonition. She will either find it amusing, or fantastically creepy. -02/08/09"_

He searched for a more recent journal, and skipped to the latest entry. Just yesterday. It must've been written before he'd gotten in the shower. The letters weren't as neat as before. The brief paragraph looked as though it'd been frantically scribbled, a desperate message. But to who? _"Terrible. Terrible. WRONG. Everything is WRONG. I have to find her. Have to fix it, it's WRONG. Is she still alive? Was she ever? I can't be here much longer. The error is blatant and suffocating, how did I ever stand it before? Reality skipped. I feel like I can see through everything, and it makes me sick. I have to fix it. I have to find her. I have to go think about this.-29/11/10"_

It was just a small glimpse into what he might've been thinking about before getting in the shower that morning. But it didn't really help any. None of the journals did. Every message seemed to be just a few sentences at most, and usually described something boring and trivial he'd done that day. No amount of knowing what he'd eaten for breakfast six months ago was going to get him anywhere. The book snapped shut, and he held it tightly for a second before placing it with all of the others. What a waste of time. He couldn't remember anything worth knowing, it seemed.

He laughed, suddenly. He drew a hand over his face, letting it rest briefly over his grinning lips. Of course he couldn't remember. Bison didn't want him to. How had it taken him so long to realize he'd been fired? It was the most obvious answer. He must've done something wrong when working with SIN-probably stealing some of that data to keep for himself-and it'd landed him in hot water. So Bison fired him, which for most people would mean death. But not himself. He must've done something to warrant keeping alive, and Bison had opted to rid him of all Shadaloo related memories instead. That was why he had none of the right phone numbers. That was why he couldn't remember Cammy.

As soon as the surge of hope at having figured it all out came, it left. Even if Bison had fired him, how did Chun-Li play into all of this? She mentioned her father, but he was dead. And she would never in her life settle down with him, one of her most hated enemies. He shook his head, irritated at having come so close to resolving this issue once and for all just so she could remind him of her presence and ruin everything again. He had it figured out in pieces here and there, but none of them fit together to form the whole picture. So he was still left clueless.

He gathered the books together again, setting them beside the box they'd come from. No sense in putting them back in there if the whole point was to unpack everything. He snorted. What was he thinking? That he was actually going to do what she'd told him and _clean_ for her? No, he didn't care. This wasn't his home, and as soon as he figured out what was going on, this was all gone for good. He looked in the box and saw one last notebook. It was a sketchbook, but there weren't sketches inside. Instead, there were newspaper clippings, some in Spanish, some in English, and they were taped to the pages. They were all articles about Shadaloo, quick notes jotted down beside some of them. He paused to read one. It clinically recounted the assassination of the British Minister of Justice, Albert Sellers, a plot presumed to have been carried out by Shadaloo. He flipped a few more pages. Another article lamented the murder of an Indian man named Dhalsim, killed by Shadaloo for unknown reasons. His notes frantically declared-_"This isn't RIGHT."_

He looked up for a second, eyes narrowing as he thought about it. No, it wasn't right. He'd been sent to intercept Cammy after she failed to kill Dhalsim. He looked back down at the clippings taped to the notebook, skipping a few pages. He stopped when he saw twelve young faces looking back at him. Above each small black-and-white picture taped to the page, he'd written a month of the year. They were all missing persons reports, and he could see pieces of descriptions he'd cut through to isolate the small photos. The dolls. Along the outer side of the page, he'd written updates to himself on them. There were various dates listed, but under each of them, it always said, _"Still missing."_ The latest one was from a month ago. But hadn't Cammy freed them years ago?

The stories only became more bizarre as he read on. There was a hazy photo accompanying a story about Shadaloo's forceful take-over of parts of Thailand. He'd circled one of the people in the picture, which depicted a burned village being monitored by Shadaloo soldiers. He immediately recognized the man who he'd indicated as Charlie Nash. "What?" he muttered out loud, shaking his head at the sight. Nash had been terminated by Bison after Guile and Chun-Li found him.

But Chun-Li hadn't joined Interpol, he reminded himself. She must have never helped Guile find Shadaloo and Charlie. He looked at the photo again. Charlie, dressed in the red and black uniform of a Shadaloo commander, held an assault rifle in his hands, and seemed to be watching the photographer. Calculating and cautious. The story went on to say that Thailand had lost thirty-six percent of its land to Shadaloo, and was requesting for the intervention of the United Nations. An even more current article a few pages later told him that eventually, Bison had seized control of Thailand in its entirety, installing himself as dictator of the country. Millions fled, embargoes were announced, but no one seemed confident that they could stop him. Reports lamented advanced technology, biological agents, and an army that never slept.

It was all giving him a headache, trying to keep up with these alleged events. How had Shadaloo become so powerful? It had been ascending rapidly just before Cammy freed the dolls. Bison's body had been destroyed soon after, and he hadn't been as strong ever since. Shadaloo suffered as well, forced to recoup its losses. He remembered being terrified of Bison's imminent return. He'd saved Cammy from the wreckage of Shadaloo, making it twice he'd spared her life when he'd been ordered to kill her. He thought Bison would be furious with him for this, but he hadn't commented on it. So when Shadaloo was ready again, Vega went back to work, killing who he was told for the sake of the organization. All of these reports seemed to indicate the opposite. Were they all true? It couldn't be that hard to fake a news article. But if they weren't real, what was the point of making them to begin with? It was layer after layer of questions and he couldn't find any answers.

He closed the book, placing it with the rest. He left the room, still mostly unpacked and empty. She could deal with it if she wanted it done so badly. Putting up with her was enough work from him, he decided. But as proud and stubborn as he acted, he had put away the dishes in the kitchen. He rationalized to himself that he just didn't like all of the clutter.

For the most part, she was gone during the day. She had a job, apparently, teaching martial arts to people. Adults had classes during the day, children later in the evening. He'd deduced this when she went on and on about her day after coming home, as though he cared. So she still knew how to handle herself in a fight, but he wondered if she was really as skilled as she was before. Or could he even call it 'before'? The year was still the same, time hadn't suddenly skipped around. It was all just different in various ways.

He still hadn't figured out why he was living here instead of Spain. He didn't suppose it was to follow Chun-Li's illustrious career as a martial arts teacher. It was hard to ask her about himself, because it made him look out of touch. Which, of course, was something he didn't need. It was already hard enough pretending to not hate her, much less to tolerate her presence, but he had to remember that she thought he was mentally ill, as well, and couldn't make himself look worse. Who knew where he'd end up if he started asking her who he was and why he was here. He'd gathered he wasn't a matador anymore. There weren't exactly a lot of _corridas_ in the American mid-west. He wondered if he even still knew how to fight like he had before, bulls or otherwise. He was still fit, but less muscular. He just hoped he wouldn't find out the hard way whether or not he could still hold his own.

The place was quiet, and he'd grown bored. He'd spent some time looking through his journals and books, and it had only all served to confuse him further. So he did what many a bored individual has done, and set about searching for himself online. Whether the two of them shared the laptop he'd found sitting on the bed, or if it was only one of theirs, he didn't know. But it was there, so he'd use it. There was much less than he was used to. The first hit was intriguing to him in that it listed him among the graduates from a Spanish university. He'd never made it that far, having dropped out of school after his mother died. He hadn't needed the education, anyway. He'd been quite successful without a degree. A different university in France had him listed as a former graduate student, and that interested him. So he'd pursued a fine arts degree as far as he could. And what was he doing with it? He couldn't figure that one out, yet. The next result down the line had been much too distracting.

It was an obituary for his father. His biological father, Sergi Ferran Quesada Basurto, whom he'd never really known. The man had abandoned him and his mother before he'd even turned five years old, and that was all he knew about him. The article was several years old. There was no photograph or anything. It was just a site for records. He'd gotten into a wreck with a drunk driver, apparently and had been survived by his son and wife. Wife. He found himself momentarily unable to swallow. Wife? Was his mother, like Chun-Li's father, still alive somehow? Abandoning his search of himself, he looked for her instead.

And there it was. Mireia Sofia Navarro, dead after months of battling cancer, just two years ago. Survived by her son. He let out a short, ironic laugh. Of course she was dead. Of course Chun-Li still had her beloved father in her life while he was once again resigned to watch his mother die as he sat by helplessly. He closed the laptop, rolling over onto his stomach, burying his face in the pillow. He covered his head with his arms. It never got any easier, thinking about what had happened to his mother. Here, at the very least, she hadn't been murdered. But that was only so much of a comfort. Death was death, and it seemed no matter how changed everyone else's lives were, the universe felt it should keep torturing him.

He again debated with himself whether or not he should leave. It felt like too much effort to keep pretending he understood what was going on. But what was he, if not a great pretender? The snide, self-loathing assertion stung him, and he squeezed his eyes shut even tighter, like he could somehow shield himself from such thoughts this way. The almost taunting notions kept rolling around in his head, and he wanted to laugh at himself for thinking he could ever be his true miserable self, even if he wasn't here right now. Even if he was back home in Spain, in the real, normal world, he would still be pretending. So why not keep playing at normalcy in this situation, as he had with all others?

This thought process lead him in circles. He argued with himself for what felt like hours over how he should be responding. He told himself to run, to get out of here because this wasn't who he was. He was not domesticated, not anybody's boyfriend or lover, and he wasn't just another no one meandering through a plain, milquetoast life. But then the rest of him asked, _run where? _Who was he to go to in this bizarre, confusing world? And further still, he grew angry at himself for asking. Why did he need someone to go to at all? The answer he didn't want to give himself whispered among his other tumultuous thoughts, hiding in plain sight but for his refusal to see it-he was completely alone here, and it scared him.

The ruminations slowly became more disjointed and less fervent as he came closer to falling asleep. How emotions could become so exhausting had always been a mystery to him, but it wasn't a question he ever saw himself answering. In the hazy and orange late-afternoon glow of the dim bedroom, he felt a weight beside him. Gentle fingers brushed his hair away from his eyes, and his brain, still clinging to its transient sleep, thought of his mother. It wasn't her, he knew, but for a moment, there was a comfort in the feeling of being cared for again. Of someone else's reassuring, loving touch, something he never admitted to himself that he missed in his life. He never thought of himself as lonely. He could sleep with just about anybody he wanted. But more often than not, he didn't. One-night stands here and there did little to quell any loneliness, but then, that wasn't what they were for, and he knew that. Her fingers raked through his hair a few more times before he felt warm lips briefly on his cheek. He'd all but forgotten what it really felt like to be loved.


	3. Chapter 3

_"But no, we cross, crisscross, and recross our old tracks like figure skaters."  
-The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish, Cloud Atlas_

A few days passed, and nothing had gone back to normal. He had done a decent job at avoiding her. Mostly for the usual reasons, but also because of a disturbing new one. He admonished himself for having ever taken solace in her presence, and vowed not to let it happen again. It didn't matter how much he missed his mother, or how confused he was by everything, or how upset he got. Her touch should have never meant comfort to him. This woman would gladly leave him for dead, if things were the way they were supposed to be, and he was supposed to feel the same way.

She'd noticed how distant he seemed, but tried not to complain. She thought maybe moving here was stressing him out. He knew this because she wouldn't stop asking how he was doing, or if he liked being here. The apartment was mostly sorted by now, with everything unpacked for her father's visit. It wasn't really something he was looking forward too. He'd never met her father. Dorai had been killed by Shadaloo operatives before Vega had joined them, so he wasn't sure who'd done it. He just knew him as the driving force behind Chun-Li, the reason she hated Bison so much.

He couldn't really find a valid excuse to not be present for this meeting, hard as he tried. He thought of himself as a creative person, but he was failing in that department at the moment. In a last desperate bid, he thought about playing sick, but Dorai was already on his way. Too late now. So he had to have dinner with the father of a woman he hated, and pretend to like it. And the father was also supposed to be dead, but why should he let that bother him?

When the knocking on the door came, he tried to stop himself from feeling so anxious. Why was this such a problem? He'd spent a decade pretending to be a well-rounded, personable almost-celebrity, talking to people who would have cried out in horror if they'd known the more unsavory things he liked to do with his time. So if he could keep up appearances for an entire _country, _why couldn't he do so for one dinner, with one family? He breathed deeply as he heard Chun-Li's footsteps heading for the door. It was a problem, he decided, because up until now, her dad existed only in thoughts and words. To see him, in the flesh, meant solidifying one of the most bizarre aspects of this alleged 'reality'. It meant he really was alive, and that things, as he really knew them, had changed, for better or worse.

"Oh!" he heard her practically squeal as she opened the door. The noise made him grit his teeth. So excited to see her dad. It should've been his mother who'd been at that door right now. "What a surprise!" he heard her add. What was so surprising about a visit she knew was coming? He ran his fingers through his hair and looked in the mirror. And almost as if it were as easy as changing clothes, he went from resentful to welcoming.

He learned when he left the bathroom that the surprise was a few of her friends, his stomach dropping as he realised how much more effort this was going to take to get through. They were talking over each other to greet her and she returned the greetings to all of them. He recognized just two of them. The brash and impetuous Ken Masters was in the process of giving Chun-Li a hug. He caught sight of the large frame of one of Shadaloo's most persistent pests, William Guile. There was also a pair of pretty blonde women he didn't recognize, gushing over how long it'd been since they'd seen Chun-Li. And finally, her father, smiling warmly and explaining how he thought it'd be such a wonderful surprise to have some of her closest friends living in the country to welcome her back. He took another deep breath, not quite prepared for everything this was going to entail. An evening with one extra person he hated was one thing. An evening with _five _extra people he hated was another matter entirely.

When he finally made his way into the room with the rest of them, it set off another round of greetings which he forced himself to return with a smile and a nod. He wasn't sure how well he was supposed to know these people. The matter was cleared up a bit by way of introductions. He suppressed the instinct to step away when Chun-Li put a hand on his shoulder. "Of course you've met my dad already. But this is Will, his wife Julia, who is Eliza's sister. And her fiance, Ken."

"Nice to meet you, man," Ken said extending a hand, and he took it without outward complaint. "Dorai said you're like, an artist, or something?"

Or something. Like a highly-skilled and experienced assassin. He just nodded in response. He wasn't sure what he was, as far as these people were concerned. "That is sooo cool," Eliza sighed. "I wish I was creative enough for something like that."

If she hadn't been pleasing to look at, he would have felt a sting of indignation from those words. He voiced his complaint more politely than he thought it. "It just takes years of work."

"Oh, your accent!" the woman chirped. So, perhaps he could deal with her doting on him, at least. He had been self-conscious about some aspects of his accent when he was younger only to find out most women ended up finding it attractive. So that put one insecurity to rest. "It's so cute."

"Babe," he heard Ken say, feigning hurt.

"Don't even start," Chun-Li said, stepping in for Eliza. "If womanizing was an olympic sport, they'd have to find something above gold to give you."

"So I'm good at it?"

"Quit while you're ahead, kid," Guile said, patting Ken on the shoulder.

"We _did _come all this way to see Chun-Li's new home," Dorai reminded everyone before they all got lost in conversation.

"Maybe you did, old man, but there are some bars here I haven't been to in far, far too long," Ken said.

Guile snorted and Julia laughed. "Glad to know you still care," Chun-Li sighed. Her dad put an arm around her shoulder and shook his head.

"Why don't you show us around?" Dorai said.

Vega waited as she led her friends and family down the hall. This night could not be finished soon enough. He could hear them talking as he waited in the kitchen. There was no reason to follow them around. There were a grand total of two rooms to show off. How extravagant. Surely it warranted a tour. "...as you can see, it's still a work in progress," he could hear her say. No doubt Ken would let loose some pithy one-liner. He glanced up as she led them back down the hall to the bedroom.

"Love your color scheme in here," he heard Julia say.

"Thanks. I hear winters can get pretty monotonous here and I just wanted some bright blue colors around to look at, just in case," Chun-Li explained and he rolled his eyes. Yes, how terribly innovative and worthy of comment to pick the _blue _bed sheets. Vega looked up on hearing footsteps again. For a brief moment, he locked eyes with Guile, and it almost felt like there was a tiny flicker of recognition there. It was swiftly followed by an almost wary look just before they broke eye contact. What it meant, he didn't know yet. It could've been as simple as Guile feeling protective of Chun-Li, or something more complicated. Whatever it meant, it stuck out to him, and stayed with him the rest of the night.

"Your place is nice and cozy," Eliza said to Chun-Li.

"Yeah, trust me, you don't want a big place, anyway. It's a hassle to keep up with," Ken said, waving a hand.

"Like _you've_ ever cleaned anything in your life," Eliza shot back.

"Maybe his plate," Guile put in. Chun-Li laughed.

"That's as good a segue as any," she said. "I hadn't really picked anywhere for dinner yet."

"Oh, come on, like it's even a question," Ken said. "This is Chicago, baby, we're eating pizza."

"Maybe not everyone likes pizza, Ken," Julia said. Vega didn't miss the purposeful look she gave the other man, or the way her eyes flicked towards him.

"Everybody likes pizza," Ken muttered. He looked at Vega. "I mean, you're okay with pizza?"

No, he wasn't. Greasy, cheese-laden slabs of dough slathered in sugary tomato sauce with basically no nutritional value were not his idea of a good meal. "If there is enough liquor, maybe," he responded dryly. But Ken laughed and slung an arm around his shoulder, causing him no end of irritation.

"This guy knows how to party, I can tell," he said with a grin. Before Vega could say anything else, Ken was already listing off a few places he had in mind. As much as he wanted to protest the meal, he had a feeling he wasn't much going to enjoy this night regardless of whether he was served a plate of hot garbage or not. So he kept quiet, preserving all of the self-control it was going to take to make it through this get-together.

Ken guided them to the agreed upon destination. Vega trailed behind, not very comfortable with speaking to any of them. Chun-Li was engrossed in a conversation with her dad. Eliza and Ken bickered while Guile added his two cents every so often, and Julia would smile. He didn't really fit into all of this and he wasn't too concerned with trying anyway. It was quite cold. The last rays of the sun glimmered against the glass of the buildings, doing little to provide any warmth. He pressed his cold hands deeper into the pockets of his peacoat and hoped the walk wasn't too far. It would only get colder. The city was still busy, with crowded sidewalks, noisy traffic, and trains squealing and rumbling overhead. It all served to annoy him further when he needed it the least.

"It's a lot at once, I know," a kind voice said softly beside him. He looked up, having been watching for wads of chewing gum on the sidewalk. Chun-Li wrapped her arm around his. "I'm sorry if it's a little stressful. I didn't expect them to all be here."

He looked at her for a minute while they waited for the signal to change. He couldn't get over how strange it was for her to treat him so kindly. She was supposed to hate him. "It's fine," he said.

"Yeah, but I just mean, I understand if it's overwhelming. Ken alone is kind of like...enough friend to be five friends on his own."

Still, he shook his head. Her worrying annoyed him. Like he wasn't used to pretending to tolerate obnoxious people he couldn't stand. At the same time, he felt a kind of light feeling in his chest. Someone was interested in how he felt, what he was thinking, and that was something he hadn't known in a long time. "It's all right," he said, hoping she'd stop reassuring him.

"Okay, good," she said warmly. "When I saw they were all here, I was really excited. My dad said they'd been planning to surprise me since I told him I'd be moving here. So it's thanks to you."

"To me?" he echoed.

"Yes. If you hadn't moved here for work, we wouldn't all be together right now. So I'm happy." She hugged his arm a little tighter, and his lips formed into a firm line. Great. So he could make her happy, at the expense of his own comfort. What a thrill that was. "And I guess you can think of this as a primer for next weekend."

God, how many obligations did he have? "What?" he asked.

"You know. Ken and Eliza's wedding. We are going to be exhausted through all of this. Moving here, getting two weeks to ourselves before jetting off to Seattle, then coming back. But I wouldn't miss it, they've always been such good friends. And I'm really happy you're being so accommodating and coming along."

Why the hell had he offered to do that? He hoped above all else that he'd go back to his normal life before the next week was up. But he'd done the same in hopes of avoiding this night, too, and here he still was. What a cruel joke this all was, being forced over and over again to spend time in the company of people who would normally have delighted in beating him half to death or throwing him in jail for the rest of his life.

It wasn't much longer before he found himself in a noisy, crowded, kitschy establishment that he supposed was decorated that way to feel more authentic and local. It was simply ugly, but no one seemed to care. Ken, ever the boss of the group, it seemed, snatched up a menu and said, "All right, what do you guys eat on your pizzas so I can tell you how wrong you are?" The others bickered with him playfully about toppings, and Vega remained largely silent until Ken remembered him. "How about it?" he asked.

He tried to think of the grossest thing people generally put on pizzas. Having never eaten them himself, he glanced at the menu and guessed. "Anchovies. No sauce or cheese."

"And with that you have waived all rights concerning designation of pizza toppings," Ken said. He didn't mind, and stayed out of the apparently heated decision making process. But it shouldn't have surprised him that food was such serious business for Americans. The conversation took off without him and he ignored most of it, catching snatches here and there, until something interesting finally came up.

"...and Ryu's off on his whole, 'gotta train' thing again..."

"How is he?" Chun-Li asked. "I haven't seen him in...wow, almost seven years now."

"He's fine. I mean after that craziness with those terrorist guys, I'm surprised he ever entered a martial arts tournament again."

"Terrorists?" Vega asked abruptly.

"Oh, hey, you're awake," Ken mused.

"He's talking about Shadaloo," Guile answered. "Ryu was offered a job by them after they held a martial arts tournament as a front for recruitment. When he refused, they almost killed him."

"Yeah, he started doing more research on his tournaments after that, and he won't go back to Thailand anymore," Ken added.

"Not many people do these days," Dorai said darkly.

"Oh, it's just so awful," Julia put in. "Those poor people. When is someone going to do something about that Bison?"

"It's more of a delicate situation than it seems," Guile said.

"Yes, but she's right," Dorai said. "It is awful. I wonder all of the time if I ever should've quit my work on them. I had some fairly hot leads back then. I find myself speculating about what would've happened if I'd pursued them."

Vega suddenly found himself choking on the water he'd been drinking. All eyes were on him now, and he flushed red from the attention being paid to his mistake as he coughed and sputtered into his hand. "Drink much?" Ken said smugly with a lopsided grin.

"I didn't expect even the water in America to have corn syrup in it," Vega shot back in a strained voice.

Ken laughed loudly apparently not understanding it was an insult, not friendly banter. "Nice," he said. "Speaking of drinks, you still want that liquor, so you can choke on that too?" Vega didn't get a chance to respond, but his face said enough.

"Oh, Ken, honestly, not every night at a restaurant has to turn into a party," Eliza sighed.

That didn't stop him from ordering a round of shots anyway. Challenges and rivalry were the only ways he knew how to make friends. So that's what he did. "I know," he said, knocking one shot back. His lips puckered briefly. "Let's make it a game. Who has a quarter or something?"

Julia set a penny on the table. "That's all you get," she warned him. She pushed the shot that'd been set in front of her to Eliza who was sitting beside her. Ken took the penny, and tapped it against the table as he talked.

"Okay. Um, Chun-Li, switch seats with me, girls versus guys," he said. Vega didn't enjoy the prospect of sitting next to Ken, but neither was he willing to show that. Maybe that's why Ken did it. "Okay. You know how to play Up Jenkins?" Vega shook his head. The word 'jenkins' sounded like something deep fried to him, vaguely conjuring up a detestable American southern accent, and maybe pancakes. "It's easy. I'm gonna pass this penny over to Eliza, one of them is gonna hide it in their hand, and you have to try to find it, pointing out if it is or isn't in their hand." Ken reached under the table, and Eliza giggled.

"I hope that's all you're doing under there," Guile said sternly.

"Naturally," Ken sighed. "Chill." Guile still didn't look amused. Dorai smirked, shaking his head a little. "Okay, so, up Jenkins!" All at once, Julia, Eliza, and Chun-Li held their hands up, elbows on the table and the backs of their hands facing outward. "Down Jenkins!" They all slammed their hands down at about the same time. "Hear it?"

"Hear what?"

"The penny. Clink clink." Ken scrunched his face as he studied the girls' expressions. Eliza was a terrible liar, Chun-Li was okay, but Julia was stone-faced. She had one of the better poker faces he'd ever seen.

Guile reached over the table and tapped Julia's right hand. "Not here," he said.

Ken touched Chun-Li's left hand. "Or here."

Vega sighed, the noise being lost in the noisy restaurant. What he wouldn't give right now for a plane ticket to Europe. He touched a finger beside Chun-Li's hand, simply because it was closest. "Not here." No penny.

"Oh, poor, poor, Eliza," Ken sighed.

"Oh yeah? You wanted those shots so bad, they're yours," she shot back with a cocky smile.

Guile tapped Eliza's left hand. No coin. Ken heaved a dramatic breath, smacked Eliza's right hand playfully with a cry of, "It's here!", and...

"Ah, damn it." No penny.

"Ha-HAH," Eliza crowed. "In your _face_ Ken Masters!"

He smirked and waved a hand at her. He picked up his drink, and nodded to Vega. "It was a good effort, right?" He knocked it back, Guile and Vega following his example. "So you get it now?" he asked Vega.

He nodded, not really wanting it all explained to him again. He didn't realize that entailed agreeing to a few more rounds of the dumb little game, each round pushing him a little closer to upending Ken from his chair and throttling him. Dorai watched from the end of the table, amused and only vaguely keeping score. The girls were winning, and Ken was loudly wondering when Eliza got so good at lying. "I think you ladies had better go easy on them," Dorai advised playfully.

"That's not what you taught me," Chun-Li piped up, her team having suffered only two losses so far.

Dorai glanced over at his daughter's boyfriend, who didn't seem to be very focused on the conversation. "Yes, you're right," he said, tapping his daughter's shoulder.

When the food eventually came, Vega had even less interest in it than before. He thought before, maybe, it could end up tasting all right. But now he saw the error of his assumptions. The alcohol in his otherwise empty stomach was daring him to add hot grease to the mix and wait until the morning to know true pain. He suddenly remembered that there was a bathroom he could go to and get a few minutes, at least, away from the rest of them. It might also make it less apparent he wasn't eating anything. He felt a little unstable on his feet, but persisted. That was when he saw him.

Balrog was not easy to miss. He was quite a large man, with intense eyes that intimidated just about everyone they settled on. He sat at a table with two other men across from him, leaving one empty seat beside him. He was leaning forward, talking lowly to the men. Vega couldn't hear the conversation over the noise. Against his better judgement, he took the seat next to the man. He could have answers. He couldn't pass up the opportunity. What were the chances, after all?

"Can I help you?" the man said dangerously, his deep voice carrying a clear threat.

"We have to talk, now," Vega demanded, squeezing his hands to fists on the table. The other two men regarded him warily before returning their eyes to Balrog. Their confusion was apparent.

"I think you got the wrong table," Balrog said. "I got you, okay? You're a little drunk, it's a Friday night, you're doing your thing with your friends. That's cool. But you'd better get your ass back with them before you hurt yourself."

"Don't make a scene, you idiot!" Vega hissed back. He held a finger up to the other two men before they could interrupt. "Something's happened. You need to tell Bison. I don't know what's going on. I need to get in touch with him, quickly."

Balrog was unreadable. Vega supposed you don't grow up in Las Vegas without learning to tell lies. "What's your name, shrimp?"

Vega laughed. Shrimp. It was what Balrog had always called him, since day one, for not being as disgustingly muscular as him. This had to be a sign. "Oh, you absolute-" He sighed loudly. "Vega. Tell Bison that Commander Vega is looking for him. I can't make it back to Shadaloo right now, but he has to fix this, because I don't know how." He spread his hands as he spoke, emphasizing his predicament.

Balrog narrowed his eyes, but nodded slowly. "You got a number?"

"Yes," Vega said, relieved. Maybe whatever went wrong had gotten to Balrog, too, but certainly Bison would remember him. Vega looked at his phone, finding the unfamiliar number, and jotting it onto a napkin. "And make it fast. This situation is maddening."

"I don't make any promises," Balrog said. "But I'll relay the message."

"Thank God. You're good for something, at least," Vega muttered. "Pardon the interruption." He nodded to the pair of men on the other side of the table before heading for the bathroom.

"You know that guy?"

Balrog snorted. "Shit. Never seen him before in my life. But he sounds like he knows just a little too much." Balrog held up his phone, snapping a quick picture of the guy calling himself a Shadaloo commander, now a few feet away. It was grainy given the low light, but it'd do. He attached it to a message directed to his boss: _"I think I got a project for your girls."_

* * *

_you all will never know how much grief it has caused me to write badly about pizza in this chapter... D: thank you to the two anonymous reviewers. Fantastic-there are some Chun-Li and Vega stories floating around on here! I can't think of the authors' names, but the stories are "Bleed", "Deep Core Crisis", and "Except Without Strength". Hey-That is a good idea! Maybe once this is finished I will append a short chapter, as I'm not sure I have enough in mind for a whole other story. Thanks for the suggestion :)_


	4. Chapter 4

_"Assured her I've never loved anyone except myself and have no intention of starting now."  
-Letters From Zedelghem, Cloud Atlas_

He couldn't think straight. He knew, in retrospect, he should've done more than pick at the pizza crust and some bits of melted cheese here and there. It would've meant less of a headache later. Drinking had done little to make the night pass by quicker. There was a lot of laughter that he'd only noticed as it happened, leaving him wondering what he'd missed and if it'd been at his expense. Getting back home-but that wasn't home-felt like it'd taken forever. One wobbling step in front of the other. He remembered something about the others going off towards a hotel in the opposite direction, something like that. That left him alone with her. So he wondered which was worse-being around all of them, or just one. Now she had no one else to pay attention to.

She put her arm around his waist and he fought the urge to push her into oncoming traffic. "You didn't eat much."

"_Yo n__o como_ peet-sahhh," he said, emphasisng the last word with his best approximation of Ken's accent.

"You drank a lot though. I guess, to make up for it?"

He wrinkled his nose, annoyed with the hint of disdain in her voice. Like he was a child who needed to be micro-managed. "Don't criticize my choices."

"I just feel bad," she clarified. "Don't feel like voicing your thoughts isn't allowed with my friends, or something. Okay?"

He let his eyes slide closed as he nodded dramatically. "You should be careful to toss around an invitation to my opinion like that. You might regret it."

"That bad, huh?" He could practically hear the smile in her voice. "It's only a couple more days." He hoped not. Having put in a word to Bison through Balrog, he thought maybe things would go back to normal soon. He would never have to sit beside the braying jackass that was Ken Masters, ever again.

She led the way back to wherever it was they lived. He wasn't familiar with this place at all, and still wondered what had brought him here. When they got inside, he initially dropped onto the bed. But then he remembered it wasn't his, and groaned dramatically into the pillow his face was buried in. Beds were nice, and he was starting to miss sleeping in one after a few days of sleeping at a kitchen table or couch. A glance at his phone told him no one had contacted him so far to get him out of this place. He frowned. It had only been a few hours. He'd just have to be patient.

"Here."

He looked up from the phone, and on a small plate before him was an offering of apple and banana slices. His eyes went from the food up to her. "What?"

"You should eat something," she insisted.

He sighed loudly, but it wasn't that he was annoyed. The idea of the food seemed wonderful right now. How she'd figured that out, he couldn't say, but he would eat it without a complaint. He was too annoyed, drunk, and tired to have even bothered cutting all of this up himself. He muttered a begrudging thanks and sat up to take the plate.

"It's okay. I just don't want you to feel sick in the morning."

He paused. "Why?" This was all wrong. His annoyance became a desperate sort of confusion. He wanted so badly to be out of this situation, but so far felt helpless. And he hated that more than anything.

"Because I care about you."

He groaned loudly at the response, resting his head in his hands with his palms against his eyes.

"What's the matter?" she asked.

"Stop. You really have to stop."

"Stop what?" He looked up and she was plainly confused. She sat next to him, and put a reassuring hand on his back.

"All of this," he said, throwing out a hand at the room around them. "You keep talking about how you care, you aren't supposed to, you realize? We hate each other."

She blinked a few times, definitely not expecting that. "Why would you think I hate you?" she asked calmly, and even that annoyed him. Didn't she ever get upset or worked up or anything to show she was feeling _something?_

"Because..." The word hung in the dark and still air of the apartment. He couldn't say. Couldn't tell her, 'because I work for Shadaloo, the people who killed your dad.' That wasn't true anymore. He couldn't tell her, 'because I despise you for suffering the same loss as me but managing to turn out all right in the end.' That would mean admitting she was better than him, admitting he'd ever been a victim in his life, admitting that his life was not exactly the most moral, or the most normal. He gritted his teeth. No, his life was fine and he didn't need to measure it by hers. He liked his life, and that was that.

"I can't think of any good reason, either," she said. Her hand came up to stroke his hair. He wanted somehow to simultaneously break her arm for touching him and for her to never move again because she looked quite beautiful with only the dim light from outside highlighting the curve of her cheek that way. "I love you, okay?" she said. He felt a sudden emptiness in his stomach, and his eyes darted away from hers. She didn't love him. She loved some strange, bizarre version of himself that wasn't real. He didn't have any more time to think about it, because she kissed him. That anxious feeling doubled, and his thoughts raced as he tried to pick just one way to react. He could blame all of it on the alcohol. He'd certainly done worse things while intoxicated. He took her face in his hands and returned the kiss with a little more feeling.

He didn't know why he was going along with this. Even if she thought he was someone else, he knew who she was. But he couldn't bring himself to stop her from sitting in his lap, or from kissing him again. When she started to take off his shirt, he should've taken that as his chance to bring himself back to reality. Reality being that they loathed each other, that he could appreciate how beautiful she looked and in the same breath want to watch her suffer. But then, he supposed, this wasn't reality, and he should get used to that.

There weren't any loud, dramatic cries and they didn't lustfully moan each others' names. It wasn't a show of how good a lay the other person was, something he'd grown used to. When someone knew they were sleeping with a guy who got around, sex became more like a challenge or a competition to them. He lost track of how many times they'd ask him afterwards how they did, like he was keeping score, or that he would even remember their names. This was different and strange to him, the way she felt so close, how she buried her face in the crook of his neck, hands coming up to run through his hair as she moved her hips over and over. She wasn't making an exhibit of herself, didn't really seem to even be thinking of herself at all. He felt less like she was showing off for his benefit, as was often the case with others, and more like she wanted to be impossibly close to him. He was quiet, listening to her quick, short breaths beside his ear, letting go a few of his own when he couldn't help it. There was nothing complicated about it, no competition to be had, no shows to put on, and that was fine.

She gasped suddenly, her hands finding his face and he flinched. He didn't like when people touched his face, but the building tension between his legs was taking priority over everything else. She was kissing him again, her forehead pressed against his, her thumbs sliding over his cheekbones and her warm breaths ghosting over his skin. He felt her lips stop and part, still pressed against his. A long exhalation followed, he squeezed his eyes shut, but that small noise from her made him lose it. He opened his eyes briefly to find hers already on him. They didn't hold desire, like he was expecting. That's all it was supposed to be, desire. Maybe not for her, but he wasn't as lucky as she was.

That moment of bitterness subsided when he felt her lips on his again, her hips slowing, the excitement waning. She leaned back, pulling him with her as she continued to kiss him softly. She broke away, and they stayed there, her chin against his head and his head on her chest. He stared across the room at nothing in particular, focusing all attentions on the way her fingers coursed through his almost-but-not-quite curly hair. It was an unwelcome reminder that she hadn't been doing this to him, but to who he was supposed to be. A feeling of worthlessness began to creep into his mind, the thrill of actually feeling loved now a subject for mockery. How could he have convinced himself, even for a moment, that she'd been looking at _him_ with those big brown eyes full of love? She just didn't know who he was, and she'd hate him all the same if she did, just like anyone else. He was so desperate for a glimpse into the sort of intimacy he'd given up on that he'd had sex with her under false pretenses, essentially. He was no better than-

Abruptly, he stood up, unable to finish the thought, and she let out a startled little cry. He didn't say anything, and just kept walking until he made it to the bathroom.

He sat in the shower for awhile, unsure of what to do with himself. That unfinished thought hounded him as he closed his eyes as tight as they would go and ran his fingers through his hair. He felt disgusted for sleeping with her, but it wasn't like he could take it back. He briefly tried to convince himself he'd done it on purpose, as if to think of her as being conquered now. He wasn't delusional enough to carry the idea very far. He didn't like the idea of using sex as an expression of power. He covered his face with his hands as if he could block this train of thought from reaching its conclusion, but it was a little too late. He tried to grasp at some other justification for what he'd done, and it all kept coming back to the same thing. He was reminded too much of the disgusting pig who'd ruined his life. The way the man would force himself on his unwilling wife. How his step-father seemed to almost do it to get back at him. To show his step-son who was boss by defiling what he cared about most.

His hands had curled into tight fists, fingernails leaving red marks in his palms and he hadn't even noticed. He forced himself to relax. No, he wasn't like that monster, and he wasn't ever going to use sex as a way to get back at somebody. He hadn't forced her into this, but had he deceived her? He slept with her because he'd been irritated, upset, and the way she'd responded just made him feel so...

He couldn't think of a better word than 'good'. She wasn't supposed to do that, and he'd hated that he let her. He spent over an hour in the bathroom, only part of it in the shower, just because he couldn't face her. He didn't want to hear her say she loved him, or for her to show him any more concern or kindness. He didn't want to take compliments and affection for someone who wasn't him. Didn't he deserve that much, for someone to recognize _him _for who he was and loving that? What was so wrong with him for wanting that? Nothing. He wasn't wrong. He couldn't be wrong.

She was asleep when he crept back into the room for his clothes. At least the world had given him that much. Quietly, he went out to the couch, and managed to fall asleep. But not for too long. It had been several hours when he was startled awake by a noise. He couldn't tell what it was. Something crashing to the ground, maybe. He sat up, and heard someone suck in a shuddering gasp from the bedroom. Was she crying? He looked at his phone. It was a bit past four in the morning. Whatever. He wasn't going to go make her feel better, it wasn't his job.

There was a heavy thud, and then he heard her shriek his name desperately. He shot to his feet and bolted for the bedroom. Anything that made somebody scream like that wasn't wise to ignore.

"Threat assessed: male, six foot one, approximately one-hundred and sixty pounds." The monotonous voice sent a chill through him, one he hadn't heard in years. The dolls had all been freed nearly a decade ago. But the pair of identically dressed women stood in the room, defensive postures assumed. Satsuki and Santamu. Chun-Li must've been assaulted by one of them. She stood with her legs apart, arms up, ready for them to strike again.

"Subject confirmed: Andrés Quesada Navarro. Collateral: Chun-Li Xiang. Commence termination."

"Termination?" he echoed in disbelief. Bison must've made a mistake!

But Santamu and Satsuki begged to differ, pouncing on him immediately. He pressed himself back against the door, Satsuki skidding into the hall as she missed him by a hairs breadth. Santamu slammed a fist into where he'd just been, knuckles cracking loudly against the wood. Chun-Li caught Santamu with a kick to the back of the head, only to be tackled violently by Satsuki. Vega started towards them to separate them, but Santamu recovered, intercepting him. He ducked her fist, driving his elbow into her stomach. She gasped but didn't miss a beat, bringing her knee up to meet his jaw.

Meanwhile, Chun-Li, now having shaken off the initial surprise of the violent break-in, was trying to match Satsuki blow for blow. The woman was fast, and seemed stronger than any girl her size had any right to be. Chun-Li didn't let it stop her though. Her father had taught her how to defend herself since she was young, and she wasn't going to squander those lessons. Satsuki dropped low, sweeping out one leg, aiming for Chun-Li's ankles. She jumped, planting her feet on the bed and then swinging back one leg. Satsuki held up one gauntlented arm to block. The doll lashed out with her other arm, and Chun-Li spun left, bringing her leg up again once more. This time the strike connected, taking Satsuki in the cheek. Her head cracked back from the force of it, and she stumbled away.

At about the same time, Vega had managed to shove Santamu back against the far wall. Both dolls were preoccupied with regaining their footing for just a second, but that window of time would have to suffice. "Get out of here, now!" Vega demanded. Chun-Li didn't have to be told twice, already running from the room they'd cornered themselves in. She could hear him right behind her, but he wasn't alone. She was just about to reach the door when he crashed into her. Satsuki had collided with him, sending the pair to the ground. Vega pushed Chun-Li hard, and the doll's foot came slamming down where the woman's head had just been.

Vega rolled onto his feet, and launched himself at Satsuki. Chun-Li took a split-second to debate whether she should leave him here to call for help, or help him herself. She couldn't bring herself to abandon him. Santamu made the decision for her, forcing her way between Chun-Li and the door. The stone-faced woman reached behind her, and Chun-Li heard the ringing sound of metal against metal. Her heart leaped into her throat when she saw Santamu brandish a collapsible spear, the pole locking stiffly into place. At about the same time, Satsuki unsheathed the sword on her back.

Chun-Li dipped, ducked, and jumped from every swipe and stab of the spear. She couldn't get close to her opponent, but she couldn't keep dodging that blade forever. Vega found himself in a similar situation. But the sword had a shorter reach. He backed away towards the kitchen instead, swiping one of the knives from the block on the counter. It wasn't much compared to the sword, but it was something. Metal clanged against metal, and he hissed when her blade sliced a neat red path down his forearm. He pushed forward, catching her on the shoulder.

In the living room, Chun-Li narrowly missed being eviscerated. Adrenaline coursed through her, and she let out a wild cry as she launched one of the smaller end tables at her opponent with a kick. She was happy now that she hadn't opted for something more expensive made from something heavier than particleboard. It struck Santamu square in the chest, sending the woman stumbling back. Chun-Li hopped forward, her foot aching from the force with which she'd slammed it into the table. She was suddenly met with the bite of the spear. It hooked into her night shirt, and a fine line of blood sprang up alongside her ribs. She persisted, leaping up and slamming into Santamu. The two hit the ground, with Chun-Li straddling the woman's stomach and struggling with her for control of the spear.

Vega desperately found himself wondering when the dolls had become so fast and powerful. They'd been formidable, certainly, but he'd always been able to handle them. He'd helped trained them, so he knew what they were capable of. It was just another discrepancy to add to the burgeoning list of problems he faced here. As if the doll heard his question, sparks of bright purple coursed along Satsuki's arms as she thrust her blade forward with a blow that would've left his guts on the floor if he hadn't sprung away. He wondered if he'd imagined it. They couldn't be imbued with psycho power. It would destroy them. He saw a brief opening, and took it, charging into her. His shoulder met her chest, and he heard her gasp as they hit the wall.

Satsuki brushed the attack aside, taking her target into a rough headlock before pulling him down to the ground with her. She rolled onto him with inhuman speed, driving her knee between his shoulder blades. Her other leg found one of his arms, pinning it to the cold tile floor. Vega gasped for air and suddenly his head was yanked back by a hand in his hair. He heard a blade whistle through the air as Satsuki drew her sword back. He was trapped, pinned under her, he could barely breathe. How was she strong enough to keep him down? He kicked frantically, trying to somehow gain leverage and failing. It wasn't going to end like this, he wasn't going to die here, confused in a world that he didn't know. He had to stop her, he must've missed something-

The thought struck him and he wondered how he hadn't seen it sooner. As she pulled again on his hair, forcing him to expose his neck for her blade, he shouted out practically all in one word as he rushed to say it, "End termination sequence subject zero zero alpha kappa sigma end collateral zero zero chi lambda xi end!" The strangled words had barely made it out of his mouth when he felt the doll stiffen on his back, her blade pressed against his throat. Santamu fell limp beneath Chun-Li, and both dolls awaited their orders. He laughed hysterically, surprised that it had even worked.

Still shaking from the rush of the fight, Chun-Li glanced over to Vega, horrified at how close he'd come to having his throat slit by the woman still pinning him to the ground. The way he laughed frightened her, and she managed to ask, "What's going on?"

"Desist offensive sequence, stand by, end," he said between peals of laughter. At once, the two women rose to their feet stoically, and sheathed their weapons. Chun-Li watched warily. How did he know how to tell them to stop? Who were these women, and why had they broken into their apartment to kill them?

Vega pushed himself to his feet, his eyes on Satsuki the whole time. He had to be cautious.

"How did you know to do that?" Chun-Li whispered, as if a loud noise would break the spell. Slowly, she drew her hand up and pressed it into her side to stem the blood flow.

He didn't answer her. He backed towards the couch, still watching the dolls. He felt for his phone. Chun-Li listened as he calmly reported the attack to-she assumed-the police. His hands were shaking, and blood was running down his arm. She swallowed hard. When he hung up, she said again, "Andrés, what is going on here?"

Finally, he looked at her, as if just noticing her for the first time. "They were going to kill us," he said.

"Why? Who are they? How did you stop them?" she asked.

He hesitated. To say the truth would make him sound insane. That he'd given those orders himself many times before when training them-though, never with the codes that meant his own name. So he shrugged, hoping she wouldn't push the issue.

"No," she said sternly. He hadn't heard her take that tone in all his time here. It was one he was more used to hearing. "No, you don't shrug something like that off! Tell me what's going on!"

He winced as he ran his arm under the water from the sink. It ran pink against the white plaster basin. He tried to think of a convincing lie as he washed the blood off of his arm. "There are these news articles, about that Shadaloo organization. One of them interviewed someone who survived an attack. He said those words, and it made them stop." He shrugged again, but this time at his inarticulate explanation. A headache was making itself known, now that the rush of the fight was over. "I thought it was worth trying."

She blinked a few times. "Interesting coincidence," she said, and he slammed the lever on the faucet shut.

"I almost had my throat slit. What do you want me to say?" he snapped. He thought he'd been pretty patient through all of this, and didn't have any more in him to spare. She looked startled, but stayed quiet. Good enough for him. He turned his eyes back to the dolls, still standing rigidly at attention and waiting for orders. It had him frantically searching for reasons Bison would find it necessary to have him killed. Nothing sprang to mind, but then, what did he know? His other self could have involved himself in Shadaloo's business somehow. Maybe that was why he had obsessively collected all of those articles in that book. What was he to do now? His last chance at figuring things out had just turned on him. He couldn't bring himself to kill either of the dolls, but letting them return to Shadaloo to report their failure would just make Bison come down on him that much harder. So they were the problem of the police, now. He couldn't ensure they wouldn't get back to Bison somehow or another, so all he could do was hope.


	5. Chapter 5

_"Yesterday, I believe I would never have done what I did today."_  
_-Half Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery, Cloud Atlas_

He'd told her not to tell the police what he'd said to the dolls. Revealing what he knew about Shadaloo wasn't something he wanted to do, especially if Bison was on the hunt. He couldn't risk the police becoming suspicious of him either. Chun-Li had agreed to remain quiet on the matter, but seemed wary of him. She wasn't used to him yelling at her, but he didn't know that.

The police took the pair of assassins at around five in the morning. Satsuki and Santamu were still on stand-by, refusing to respond to the inquiries of anyone who didn't know how to speak to them. It was a failsafe, and kept them from revealing anything important. They didn't resist arrest due to the threat assessments they were likely processing. Too many guns, too small a space. He wasn't sure if the cops would make it to a prison alive, but once the dolls were out of here, they weren't his problem anymore. Unless they attacked again.

Before the police had left, Chun-Li's father and Guile had come over. They'd had to wait until the cops were gone to get into the apartment. When they did, Chun-Li threw her arms around her dad and didn't seem willing to let go. She tearfully exchanged words with him in Chinese. Vega couldn't help but be amused by how frightened she was by all of this. It was just another day in the life. She'd fought much worse than a pair of dolls before. But not here, he supposed.

"You all right, kid?" He looked up at the larger man beside him. Guile indicated his arm. "Looks pretty nasty."

"It's fine."

"What went on, exactly?"

Vega shrugged. "They broke in and tried to kill us."

"Maybe they had the wrong place," Guile offered, trying to rationalize the situation. He knew Chun-Li would never get caught up in anything that would have someone coming to murder her. This boyfriend of hers though...He didn't really know. There was a weird feeling he got when talking to the man, like he was looking at some thin veneer of civility. Like he was straining to remain agreeable. He thought of Chun-Li as generally having good judgement of character, and he hated to speak ill of someone he didn't really know. But there was something, to put it plainly, wrong about this guy. So he prodded. "You don't seem all that shaken up by this."

"Shock, perhaps, I don't know," Vega said.

"You ever been in a fight before?" He knew Chun-Li had grown up learning self-defense from her dad and some other guy named Gen whom he'd never met. She taught other people in turn, but had never really had serious cause to use it. He understood how she could hold her own in a fight. But her boyfriend, he didn't know much about.

Vega hesitated, unsure of how to respond. He normally didn't mind people asking him about himself, but it was difficult when he didn't know the answers. "Not really," he said, taking a stab in the dark. An answer of yes could imply some kind of violent history, and he couldn't risk it.

Guile nodded, but didn't say anything else. What kind of a mess had this kid gotten himself into, and was Chun-Li going to let herself be dragged into it? Not if he had anything to do with it. He didn't have more to say, and stepped back over to Chun-Li and Dorai. Another anomaly. What kind of boyfriend didn't comfort his girlfriend after they'd just survived a pretty intense near death experience? He glanced back at the man in question. He was leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets, eyes intensely focused on nothing, lost in thought. Guile was beginning to like this guy less and less.

"You all right?" he asked Chun-Li. He'd given her and Dorai a minute, not wanting to be in the way. She nodded up at him, but she still seemed shaken up. He noticed the blood on her shirt. Her hand went to her side.

"I'm lucky that this is all that happened. Those women were something else," she said.

"How do you mean?" he asked.

"They were so fast and strong. I mean, I'm not exactly fighting people all the time, but it was just..." she trailed off, closing her eyes. "I don't know how to describe it. I thought we were going to die."

"I'm happy you're okay." He patted her shoulder. "Listen, can I talk to you alone for a minute?" She looked a little surprised, but nodded. She led him back to the bedroom, where the window was still open from the attack. Those women had snuck in through it, quiet as mice. She shuddered to think of the way she woke up, alone in her bed and that horrifying feeling of realizing there were people in her room who shouldn't be. She tried to put the thought out of her mind, knowing she'd be reliving the moment over and over each time she tried to sleep again.

"What's the matter?" she asked Guile.

"Your boyfriend. Is he..." he waved a hand as he searched for a polite way to phrase his question. "Involved in any kind of illicit activity?"

"No," she said quickly. "He's never been into anything bad or illegal."

"That you know of," Guile clarified.

"Period," she corrected. "You know my dad. As soon as I told him I'd met a boy in Paris, he was running background checks before I even got off the phone." She sighed, able to tell Guile was still weighing her boyfriend's character.

"I don't know how safe it is for you to stay here."

"Well, where would anyone be safe from a break in?" she challenged.

"This wasn't just a random break in. They tried to kill you two. And I have a feeling it isn't you they were here for, exactly."

She was quiet, remembering how one of the women had said something about terminating her boyfriend, and she had been 'collateral'. They'd named him, specifically as a target, and she just happened to be a witness who needed taken care of. It made her wonder what he'd done to bring this on. If anything. But he wasn't a bad person, she knew it in her heart. "Why? Why would someone want to kill him?"

Guile shrugged. "Maybe he borrowed some money from the wrong people. Maybe he has some bad habits you just don't know about yet. Shadaloo has its finger in a lot of pies. Say he bought drugs or something. Maybe he stiffed the dealer. Dealer gets his supply from somebody and that somebody could be the biggest terrorist organization on the planet. They don't like being wronged, even over the small stuff."

"That's ridiculous. He doesn't do drugs."

"It was just an example. Shadaloo doesn't make a habit of killing people half a world away without some reason. And Andrés isn't exactly the usual target in so far as being an active threat to them-lawyers, cops, district attorneys, politicians..." She looked troubled now. He could see she was biting on the inside of her cheek.

"He has seemed distant lately. A little different. I thought-I mean, he's sick. Don't tell anyone, please, but he's had mental issues ever since his mom died. It comes and it goes, and I thought, maybe it's just that. So I'm trying not to pressure him to behave any certain way." She looked up at Guile. "But maybe it's not. Maybe you're right."

He held up a hand. "Don't jump to any conclusions just yet. But keep your mind open to the possibility, is all I'm saying. There might be a lot about him you don't know." He looked up towards the door. "If something like this happens again, I'd greatly prefer it if you came back to New York. I'm sure your dad would, too."

She hesitated, but ultimately nodded slowly. It would make him feel better. But she couldn't truthfully say she'd be willing to abandon her boyfriend so easily. She just couldn't see what had happened to make someone want to kill him. Maybe it was a mistake altogether, and they had meant to find some other guy. Some other guy with his _exact _name. Whatever the reason for all this, she couldn't judge anyone yet. She just had to hope this was all some kind of fluke, and that they'd both be okay.

As the two spoke, it left Vega alone with Dorai. At first, he hadn't noticed, too absorbed in his own thoughts. Then the other man spoke. "I'm glad you're both okay. You don't often hear about survivors when it comes to things like this."

Vega nodded. He really didn't relish the idea of speaking with Chun-Li's father.

"Listen." The man stepped a little closer, lowering his voice. Vega felt a hand on his shoulder and suppressed a grimace. He was being touched by the dead father of one of his most hated enemies. He could not begin to think of a stranger sentence than that. "I'm not going to judge you. I don't want to be one of those dads sticking his nose in his child's business all of the time. But if you've gotten involved in something, and you need help..."

Vega's lips twitched up at the implication. "It's nothing like that," he answered. "I have no idea why this is happening." He did, but he couldn't say. He regretted ever approaching Balrog in that restaurant. Of course Bison wasn't going to react well to someone identifying and naming one of his highest-ranking officials. He'd been so desperate to get back to reality he hadn't stopped to think about it.

"There's no shame in admitting to the problems we face," Dorai said calmly and it just pissed him off more. He didn't have any problems but the big glaring one, and he hadn't brought that on himself. Someone was bent on torturing him, that was all he could conclude. "Is it money? Drugs?" The words hadn't been accusatory, but Vega despised them all the same.

"No," he said, willing himself to stay calm and not blow up in this man's face.

Dorai nodded. "I just want you to know that the offer of help is always going to be there. Whatever it is. We don't have to talk about it with anybody. I just want to make sure you two are safe."

"I appreciate it," he forced himself to say, though he couldn't look the older man in the eye.

"It's what dads do," he answered with a reassuring smile. _I wouldn't know_, Vega thought bitterly at the man. "Chun-Li really loves you. She thinks the world of you, and I like seeing her so happy." The edge to that bitterness lessened, giving way instead to confusion. So he made her happy. And that's what was wrong.

The day turned out to be cold, grey, and windy. Snow fell relentlessly, and the weather served as a deterrent from any kind of outdoor activity. Ken complained that even the fifteen minute walk from the hotel to the apartment had been enough to numb his face. Vega wished it would've remained that way so he wouldn't have to hear the man talk. Dorai and Guile had stayed in the meantime as they waited for the other visitors to arrive. It had been incredibly uncomfortable. Vega didn't want to be there to begin with. Being sat down and spoken to about his 'options' and those little hints they made about him, implying he was involved in some petty activity that had angered Shadaloo made it even worse. He wanted to tell them Shadaloo didn't send the Dolls after people who cheated drug dealers. Anyone they sold drugs to for redistribution at a street level was responsible for payment, regardless of whether or not their customers actually payed them. Little scuffles like that weren't worth Bison's time.

But he'd had to just nod and insist he didn't know what was going on, that he was happy to hear their advice as law enforcement officers, and that he hoped this had all been some strange mistake. He was finally able to excuse himself to go take a shower and get ready to face another miserable day full of pretending to be friends with people he couldn't stand. While Guile had treated him with outright suspicion, Chun-Li's father was just insistent with his offer of help. Vega had to deny over and over that he'd done anything to draw Shadaloo's attention, even if they sent someone to kill him. He couldn't very well say that this wasn't his life, that everything about this world was wrong and different, and that in his desperation he'd tried to get a message to Bison. They'd think he was insane. And, apparently, as far as everyone else was concerned, he was, so there was no point in that discussion. He just had to keep pretending that he didn't know what all of this was about.

It was as horrible a way to start a morning as any other he could think of. The subject was eventually dropped, and the others arrived with bags in tow. Vega was pained to think of what that implied. Surely he would not be forced to share such a small space with all of these people. He'd rather be outside, even in the snow and biting wind, than spend an entire day under the same roof as Ken Masters.

But that was exactly what he was forced to do. He kept praying that something would come up, forcing all of them to leave. Even a simple errand needing to be run would have been a blessing. The bags had been full of what he'd been afraid of-board games, video games, groceries, beer. This was not him. The last thing he wanted to do with his spare time was play a board game with anyone, and he'd never touched a video game in his life. Beer disgusted him, and he hated to think of what the groceries were for given Ken's affinity for horrible food. He'd announced that he and Eliza were going to make dinner, and those words came out like a death sentence. Not only did it mean he'd have to eat with these people again, but it meant they'd be here for a very long time. Wasn't there something he could excuse himself to go work on? No, he didn't even know what he did for a living yet. This day was shaping up to be so painfully average, and he hated it. He hated being boxed in with these people, hated their stupid, boring games and past-times, and felt very desperate for some sort of adrenaline-fueled venture to make up for how horribly plain everything had been. The fight with the Dolls now seemed to him the highlight of his past week, because at least that had gotten his heart pumping.

"How have you never played a video game before?" Ken asked incredulously as he hooked up the console to the television. Vega didn't even regularly watch TV, much less play any games with it. "Sit down, I'll teach you."

He wanted to scream at him. No more games, no more teaching, he didn't want to hear Ken's voice ever again in all his life. "I don't know if-" he started, and had to restrain himself from lashing out with a fist when Ken talked over him.

"Ah, don't worry so much, it's easy, I promise," he insisted, giving Vega a controller. It felt foreign in his hands and seemed complicated. There were so many buttons, even on the top. What they all did, he didn't know. Vega felt like his eyes had maybe glazed over as Ken explained to him what all of the buttons were for. "You'll get the hang of it."

"Oh, this is going to be good," Chun-Li said as she took a place on the couch beside Eliza.

"Have more faith in your man," Ken said. "He's going to need it."

"The only video game Andrés has ever played was Pac Man, and he spent more time wondering what the story was supposed to be than actually playing the game," Chun-Li explained. She did a poor impression of him, meant to be affectionate, "'Why do ghosts want to kill me? What is even a pac-man, anyway'?"

"I do _not _sound like that," Vega muttered.

"So," Ken said, looking at the screen. "You should probably pick the Soldier."

Vega squinted at the screen. They all looked like soldiers, wearing armor and holding guns. "How?"

Ken held back a laugh and showed him. "Okay, so the point is to basically kill all the bad guys and do the missions the game tells you to do."

"Oh." Vega listened as the game talked, saying something about 'enemy personnel' and 'data retrieval' and suddenly he saw something move. He looked down at the buttons and tried to remember which one Ken had said would fire a gun.

"Dude, that's me." He heard Eliza laugh, and he felt someone pat him on the shoulder. "Okay, _that _is the enemy. Kill them." He was going to kill something alright.

"Why are they against us?" Vega asked.

"It doesn't matter, it's a game," Ken said, grinning. "You're starting to remind me of Ryu."

Vega didn't really like that comparison. He didn't say anything though, since he wasn't supposed to know Ryu. He tried to focus on the screen, but all of those monsters were moving fast and he couldn't keep up. He kept having to look at the controller and try to remember what the buttons did. He pushed something and there was a big explosion.

"Nooo," Ken said suddenly. "Save those, we'll need them when the fifth wave comes."

"Wave?" Vega echoed. This was entirely too much. He had no idea what that meant.

"Oh, you killed one of them," Chun-Li chimed in. "Better than I expected." Even she, his supposed girlfriend, had no confidence in him.

"Ah!" Vega said suddenly. Something hit his person, the controller rumbled in his hands, and he hadn't realized how ugly these monsters were until one was chomping on his neck.

"Push B!"

"What is B?!" Vega shouted, caught up in the moment as the monster continued to assault his character. Ken only laughed back, leaving him to fend for himself. He looked down, found the button, and pushed it over and over until finally his player broke free, punched the creature in the face, then stomped on it.

"Nice!" Ken said. "See, you're getting it."

"I don't-" He looked back up in time to see some enormous thing lumber out into the area. It drew back a massive arm, and charged, slamming into his character and pounding it into the ground. "Oh!" he cried. "What the hell is that?!"

"I told you to save your rockets, dude," Ken sighed. "It's all right, though, I'm used to this. I could probably solo platinum, so bronze is like a walk in the park."

Vega had no idea what that meant. Guile said, "It sounds like you need to go outside more often, Ken."

"Man, do you know how cold it is out there?"

Vega decided he was done trying to figure out video games for now. So what if Ken was better than him at this? He had no interest in it to begin with. He set aside the controller for whoever was willing to take it. It'd be best if he could find a reason to not be in that room with all of those people anyway. But there wasn't really anywhere to go. He stepped into the kitchen, and even that little bit of extra space felt refreshing. As he grabbed a drink, he noticed some of the food Ken and Eliza had brought here. There had been fish in the fridge. And were those sheets of nori on the counter? The prospect of Ken making a meal that wasn't absolutely disgusting was a welcome one. "You're going to make sushi?" he asked, a little surprised.

"Yeah," Ken answered back, distracted as he was engaged in a different game with Chun-Li.

"We normal people are probably going to eat sandwiches if you want actual food instead," Guile added.

"You won't even try it, so I don't know how you know you don't like it," Dorai said.

"Don't be silly, dad," Chun-Li said. She suddenly deepened her voice in an impression of Guile, and said, "That's not what family men go home and do."

Ken cackled loudly, and Vega smirked, though the cup hid it from view. "I say that _once_, and you people won't let me live it down," Guile muttered.

Vega spent a lot of the time moving around. Being in the room with all of them was like being underwater. He had to leave the area and come up for air. Just as the night before, he only listened to about half of what any of them were saying, and answered as politely as he could any of the questions directed at him. And just as the night before, he felt trapped in here with them. Pacing around the place helped a little bit, reminding him there were rooms to go to that had no people in them, that he could be alone for a few minutes. Ken commented once about Vega's inability to sit still for more than twenty minutes, and before he could make a remark, Chun-Li was already defending him. It was strange, to say the least, hearing her stick up for him.

He deigned to play one game with them in the interest of keeping in character. It was something that involved making words out of tiles of letters as fast as possible. They played a few rounds and he was happy that he'd won all of them except for one, which Julia had won. After the fourth round, Ken seemed to be frustrated, which just served to please Vega all the more. "Okay, 'axiomatic', 'parallax', really? Are those even real words? Is it Spanish? That's not allowed," he'd said as he squinted at the tiles on the floor.

"They're English words," Vega insisted. Getting two words out of one 'x' tile felt impressive, so he wasn't going to let someone take this victory from him.

"Take the loss like a man, Masters," Guile said from his spot on the couch. He'd watched a few rounds, knowing full well how horrible he was at word games.

"Well, I didn't know I'd be up against the human dictionary here," Ken muttered with a shrug. He really didn't like losing, but didn't take it personally. To make that clear, he said to Vega, "You're a beast, dude."

He narrowed his eyes. "I'm sorry?" He didn't like being compared to an animal, and people in Shadaloo made such comments with regularity. The claw invited the comparison, and his savage and relentless nature supplied the rest. For a few intense seconds, he thought somehow this version of Ken was picking up on something that had so far remained a secret. He was both angry and nervous.

"He means you're really good at this game," Eliza clarified.

Embarrassment quickly replaced everything. "Oh," he said, looking back down at the letters. The word 'fraud' jumped out at him, and he didn't remember playing it. He scrambled the letters with one hand, deciding he'd had enough.

He carved away at the time, little by little, glancing at his phone every so often to reassure himself the world was still moving. It was difficult, being so civil towards her friends like this. He tried to keep telling himself this wasn't the worst thing he'd ever had to do. That this should be child's play. Some things, though, were easier said than done.

He'd watched rather patiently as Ken bickered his way through the process of making sushi with Eliza. He didn't say anything, and no one really said anything to him, being more absorbed in other conversations at the moment. He steeled himself as he realized with dinner came discussions that weren't interrupted by video games or something just as menial. The possibility that they'd ask him more about himself was one he recognized, much as he didn't want to. He was trying to come up with different ways to answer things that might elicit more of an explanation from Chun-Li to avoid getting anything wrong. "Bam!" Ken said suddenly, getting everyone's attention. "A butt-load of delicious food is now served."

"Why on Earth would you associate eating with the word 'butt'?" Chun-Li said.

"There's something he needs to tell us about how he spends his evenings, I'm sure," Vega purred, taking his chin in his hand as he leaned his elbows onto the counter. Any chance to embarrass Ken seemed like it was worth taking. But Ken seemed almost invulnerable to such remarks.

"I thought we'd tell them together, dear," Ken said without missing a beat, reaching over the counter and taking Vega's free hand. He fought the urge to pull away. He refused to allow such a reversal.

"Oh my God," Eliza sighed. "Why am I marrying you?"

"Okay, hey, food," Ken said, handing her a plate. She stuck her tongue out at him before turning away and finding a seat. They all found a place, and Vega was fine with his spot being a bit further away from the rest of them. He hoped that it would make them notice him a bit less. But that hope was quickly dashed as the first question was directed towards him.

"So, you start work on Monday, don't you, Andrés?" Julia asked politely.

He nodded, supposing it sounded like it could be true.

"What do you do again?" Guile wondered. Vega couldn't help but think there was an ulterior motive to the question. Like he was being sized up. He recalled their earlier conversation that morning, and the way Guile had seemed so suspicious.

"Art," he said. It was right, sure, but what did he _do _with art was a question he still didn't have an answer to.

"I think he means the teaching at the university," Chun-Li supplied and he could've thrown his arms around her for it.

"Right," he said quickly. Then the reality sunk in and he wanted to frown. Teaching? He wasn't liking the sound of that.

"How do you teach art? It sounds hard, like you either know it or you don't," Eliza said, nose wrinkled. She was like a cute little animal, and seemed about as bright.

"It's like anything else," Vega replied. "If you practice it enough, you can do it." Thankfully, the conversation turned towards other topics. Topics that required much less input from him, though his opinion was asked after every now and then.

"I saw those pictures of you guys in those mountains," he heard Eliza say. "You guys are seriously brave to be hanging off of cliffs and stuff."

"Oh, I'm brave," Chun-Li said. "But not that brave. All of the cliff-hanging and jumping on precarious rocks is Andrés, not me."

"Sounds dangerous," Guile commented. Vega felt a sting of indignation. If only the man knew the extent of the dangerous things he'd done in his life.

"Dangerous pretty much inherently equals fun most of the time, that's just how it is," Ken said with a shrug.

"That's really stupid," Guile said authoritatively. Like a dad scolding a child.

"Come on, I just mean, it's no coincidence the most extreme sports are also the most enjoyable. Back me up dude, I'm defending your hobby here," Ken said, half-joking as he glanced over to Vega.

"'Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world'," he put in, somewhat amused by Guile's stubborn attitude towards their penchant for risk-taking.

"Schopenhauer," Dorai said suddenly, and Vega looked up. He hadn't really expected anyone to recognize the quote. "Also a noted misogynist and hypocrite."

"We all have our flaws, I suppose," he responded, briefly closing his eyes.

"Hopefully not those same ones," Dorai said. He still made an effort to sound friendly. But Vega wondered how much of it was an act. Vega imagined if he had a daughter, he wouldn't ever be pleased with any man who tried to date her, and it made him curious as to what Dorai must have thought of him. He appeared amicable enough, given their earlier conversation. He couldn't know for sure, certain the man was not tactless enough to outright speak poorly of him to his face. It was a discussion he would have to save for later, if later ever came.

* * *

Sorry this ran a bit long, but it was necessary or the pacing would be sort of weird. Also, I don't mean to come off as pretentious by throwing around philosophers names or anything. Truth be told, I know very little about philosophy and could never hold my own in a conversation on it, but have read that Vega was described as 'intelligent', and somehow imagine his intelligence to be more philosophical/cultural/historical than STEM-y, if that makes sense...

Thank you also to anonymous reviewer, Kaptu, it was very flattering ^^


	6. Chapter 6

_"Perhaps those deprived of beauty perceive it most instinctively."_  
_-An Orison of Somni-451, Cloud Atlas_

Her father stayed over that evening, tentatively asking permission before committing to it. Vega knew it would sound strange and suspicious to say no, regardless of how much he wanted to. He didn't like the implication that he was not capable of defending himself, or that he needed watching like a child. But Dorai was more concerned with Chun-Li's well being than taking any stabs at Vega's self-sufficiency. The older man was much more upset by the break-in than he let on, hesitant to come off as too overbearing to his daughter. With the couch taken up by someone else, Vega found himself forced to sleep in the bed with her. It was something made even stranger by the presence of her father. He'd never met the parents of any women he'd been involved with, as those flings were usually resolved within a week. This left him at a bit of a loss. How was he expected to act? Then he wondered why he cared at all. He'd never given a damn about the opinions of his own 'father figure'. Why would he bother starting now?

In an effort to minimize consciously sharing such an intimate space with Chun-Li, Vega went to sleep earlier than he normally would have. That left Chun-Li some time with her father. She kept in regular contact with him, but didn't get to see him as often as she liked. His presence here made her feel safer. It wasn't that her boyfriend didn't. But there was something about being with her dad that gave her confidence that things weren't going to go wrong, that nothing bad would happen. Or that, even if they did, she could look to him to know exactly what to do, and things would be okay. Obviously, that wasn't always true, but the feeling was comforting, and that was what mattered.

"I really can't express how happy I am to see you again," she said, settling onto the couch next to him. She was ready to show him some pictures. He was still a bit old-fashioned, and wasn't on any kind of social networking sites. She didn't mind. Some parents could get kind of nosy, stalking their kids around the internet. It wasn't a problem she had to worry about that with him as much. She supposed she could e-mail them to him, but in a way, she preferred this. Saving her pictures and some of the stories until the next time they met made the exchange feel more sentimental.

"I'm glad you found your way back around these parts," he responded. He'd moved to New York with his work. After his close brush with Shadaloo in China years ago, he'd been relocated to the United States to work in one of Interpol's offices. Gone were the days of chasing criminals on foot. He missed the action sometimes, but not the risks. He was always reminded that he'd made the right decision when he saw his daughter again.

She shrugged. "I liked Europe, don't get me wrong. I made a lot of good friends. But I'm happy to be closer to you and Ken and Eliza and everybody else. We're all like a big family by now, so it was kind of hard being apart from everybody." Guile had been her father's partner in their work on Shadaloo for some time. The man was at first hesitant to be working with Dorai, preferring to work alone. But the two eventually became better friends, and Chun-Li took a liking to both him and his wife. Julia was always there for her like an older sister, and had made the transition from China to America a lot easier on her. It wasn't long before she was introduced to Julia's little sister and her boyfriend, Ken. The three of them, being closer in age to Chun-Li, became fast friends and did practically everything together. When she'd been accepted to a school in France, she'd had a hard time filling her days without them.

"Well, we're always here if you ever need us," he said. "You know that."

She nodded. "Yeah. This weekend if flying by kind of fast though." She thought about the attack, and bit back mentioning it as part of the reason why. It made her wonder why she was willing to stay here another night. She kept trying to tell herself the police had arrested the two women, but it provided little comfort. Her father had advised that she should consider moving, but she couldn't bring herself to abandon her boyfriend that way. She thought of trying to convince Andrés to look for a job somewhere else. He had to be as shaken up by this as her, even if he wouldn't express it.

"You'll see us again next weekend, don't worry."

"Oh! Right, Ken and Eliza's wedding. Wow, they've been together forever!" she said.

"Marriage is a serious dedication, so it's better to take your time than to rush it." He smiled a little, and waved his hand. "But that's a conversation for another day. Why don't you show me your photos?"

"Okay, could you believe Andrés had never been to China before? He's been all over Europe, so I had to bring him to see home..." She recounted some of the more pertinent details of the trip, sharing her pictures with her dad. She wasn't a great photographer by any means, but that wasn't the point. She laughed as she told him how his teachings had come in handy when someone tried to mug them. She remembered how her boyfriend had joked about gender roles after she'd defended the two of them. She'd disarmed the criminal with a swift kick, and knocked him out with another to the face. "He should probably learn a thing or two, really."

"He's not much of a fighter, then?" Dorai asked. It wasn't that he disapproved of Chun-Li being the one to get the pair out of a tough spot. He worried to think of her getting into such situations, but it made him proud to know how strong of a daughter he'd raised.

She shook her head. "No, never known him to really fight with anybody."

"So you fought those two women by yourself last night?" An impressive feat, if that was the case.

"No," she said. "We were each sort of facing off against one of them. It was really frightening."

He nodded slowly. It was an even more impressive feat that someone who couldn't even defend himself against a mugger had fought with a Shadaloo assassin and survived. They had limited information on Shadaloo's ranks, but the all-female squad referred to as the Dolls were known to have never spared a target. Everyone they faced, they killed, and even people with teams of protectors had fallen to them. Something about the situation seemed off, like he was missing something. "It's really a miracle the two of you are still alive." It pained him to have to ever say a sentence like that to his daughter. He couldn't fathom what painted them as a target, other than one thought he didn't want to face. That his role as an Interpol officer had led Bison to target him where it really hurt-by attacking his daughter. It was the only thing he could think of, if Chun-Li's boyfriend really was as clean as he said. He made a mental note to remember to run a more current background check on the young man. But even that might not turn up what he needed.

"Yeah, I'm sorry, I don't want to think about it," she said. It was true, but she also didn't want to be put in a position where she had to choose between her father and her boyfriend. Andrés had asked her not to tell anyone what he'd said to their would-be killers, the way he'd shouted what sounded like random gibberish and made the women stop. But if her dad asked more about it, could she really lie to him?

"Of course," Dorai said, putting an arm around her. He decided it was a good time to change the subject, anyway. "How do you like the city so far?"

"I'm still new to it," she admitted. "I look forward to getting to explore it more as it warms up."

"This weather is something else," he agreed, nodding.

"Yes, but there's a lot to do here indoors, so I'm sure we can find something to do with out free time."

"You two be careful around here," he advised. He couldn't help it. Chicago was not exactly one of the safer cities for one to live in.

"All the time." She smiled up over at her father. "Don't worry so much, okay?"

He smiled back, but how could he not? Was his work still putting their lives at risk, even when he conducted it from behind the scenes? Or was her boyfriend hiding more about himself than any of them realized? "I'll try," he conceded. They wrapped up their conversation, growing too tired to stay awake much longer. Chun-Li hugged him before heading off to bed, feeling slightly guilty. She knew she had to go to sleep sometime, but she couldn't shake the feeling that she should be spending every moment she had with her father before he left for New York. She tried to tell herself it was just a combination of anxiety from the attack and the amount of time she'd gone without seeing him in person.

She moved quietly into the bedroom, and glanced around. Just as things should be. No extra people. No open windows. She sighed, wondering how long it would take before the paranoia wore off. She looked over the sleeping form in the bed, as if to reassure herself it wasn't a stranger laying there. Not someone waiting for her to slip into bed and let down her guard before they sprang on her. She shook her head, trying not to think too much about such a situation. She changed into her usual sleeping clothes before silently getting into bed.

Laying awake was like torture, but she couldn't fall asleep. Her nerves were rattled by every sound, and there were a lot of them. Mostly from outside, though there was the occasional sudden crack or pop of the place settling, or the hum as the heat kicked on. A week was not enough time to know all of the noises a home could make. Her insomnia was made worse every time she closed her eyes, as she began to imagine someone slinking quietly into the dark room. It became impossible not to open them again, and the cycle began anew. She sat up briefly and surveyed the room. Of course there was nothing there. Of course she was just scaring herself. Taking even, deep breaths, she tried to relax.

An hour must've passed with her trying to force herself into sleep. She looked over at Andrés. He made it look easy. Slowly, she reached over to him, finding his arm. The contact, she thought, might help make her feel calmer. Just the reassuring knowledge that someone else was there with her could possibly get her to sleep. She realized it had been a long time since he'd even slept in the same bed as her, much less held her. It made her miss him, in a strange way. She told herself that was silly, that it wasn't as if he'd abandoned her. She tried to remember that everyone had their own issues they were dealing with, and that she shouldn't take it personal if he slept on the couch every now and then. If she just gave him time, she was sure he'd go back to being just as affectionate as before. With that in mind, she reflexively squeezed his hand as she held it to her chest. "It's you," he whispered suddenly, and she felt guilty for having woken him up.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to wake you," she said, turning her head a little to look at him.

"No, don't ever be sorry," he said, voice still quiet and a little strange. She felt a fluttering in her stomach as he touched her cheek, caressing her skin with his thumb. "I found you."

The warm and fuzzy feelings began to disappear, replaced now with concern at the strange, almost desperate way he was speaking to her. His eyes looked as if they weren't focusing on her completely, like he was looking through her and not at her. He must've been dreaming, or talking in his sleep. He didn't usually do that, but it was all she could think of to explain the way his voice sounded and how his eyes looked. "Are you okay, Andrés?" she asked, turning over to face him.

"My name, you know my name, it's really you," he whispered, and were tears springing up in his eyes? She was seriously concerned now. She sat up, and his hand fell limply from her cheek to the bed. He reacted slowly, he shook his head. "I don't understand," he said, pushing himself up. His movements were a little quicker now, and he took her hand. "Help me, okay?"

"What is it? What's wrong?" she asked, now sounding a little desperate herself.

"I didn't want this to happen."

"What do you mean?"

"Please just don't-" He stopped suddenly, and it was like he'd somehow awakened from already being awake. Like he'd snapped out of a trance. Now with a sort of rushed grogginess, he said, "What? Let go." He shook her hand from his, and she drew it back to her chest.

"Are you okay?" she asked cautiously. Whatever had happened, he was over it, but she wasn't. He'd sounded so upset, so far away, so desperate. Like he could barely see her.

"_Estoy s__eguro_," he muttered. "Don't touch me." She watched as he laid back down, facing away from her. She leaned over slowly to get a better look at his face. His eyes were closed, he looked placid, and his breathing was even.

She pressed her lips together as she decided that he must've been dreaming. She hoped that was the case, the alternative being a more serious problem. That was a conclusion she didn't want to jump to so quickly, though. Sometimes people just did odd things when they got to a point between sleep and wakefulness. She laid back down, concern still gnawing at her. It took some time, but she eventually slept, even if only for a little while.

In the morning, Vega was left alone while she saw her friends off. They went out for breakfast, and he wasn't obligated to go along. He claimed he had work to do, and in reality, he did. Through conversations with Chun-Li and her friends the previous day, he learned he had a job teaching. _Teaching. _The only thing he'd taught in his life were the myriad ways to murder someone, to a class of about twelve brainwashed young women. Yes, he was good at it, but surely it wasn't the sort of thing a university was looking for in a professor. There was also that word, 'professor'. It made him sound distinguished, but also old, so he hated it. His whole morning had been spent anguishing over whether or not he should go through with going to the university tomorrow and actually working. The prospect of compensation was nice, but the means by which he'd be getting it was not. In the end, he decided he would go, as he couldn't tell how long he would be stuck here. Leaving himself without any way to earn money wasn't a good idea, and there was also the reassuring fact that Bison generally never had targets killed in public places like schools. He was more at risk staying in the apartment by himself all day than going out.

He got on the computer with the intention of seeing if his other self had anything that would clue him in on how, exactly, to teach a class. Or even, what kind of classes he was teaching to begin with. He ended up picking through some of the local news sites, finding reports about the Dolls who'd attacked him and Chun-Li. Word traveled fast. Murders were certainly not unspeakable in Chicago. But one attempted by Shadaloo was newsworthy. The women who'd been arrested were quickly recognized as two of the eleven missing girls rumored to have been kidnapped by the terrorist organization nearly ten years ago. They were silent throughout their arrest, never saying anything to give themselves away. They were in custody for the weekend before disappearing as if they'd never been there to begin with. No security footage revealed anything. They were simply gone.

He knew it was bound to happen. He thought at first that Bison had sent someone to break them out. But then he remembered the way Satsuki's limbs had sparked with the violet crackle of psycho power, and he began to wonder if they'd used it to escape. If that was the case, would they be coming back to try to kill him? He'd ended their attack sequence, which should have meant they'd leave him alone. At least, until someone else gave them new instructions. The weekend seemed to be passing without further incident, so he kept hoping it'd stay that way until he could make it back to the real world.

Monitoring the news on the Dolls brought a startling event to his attention. Websites were buzzing with article after article of Shadaloo's rampant expansion as it devoured nearly all of Indochina. Images of row after row of Bison's mechanical soldiers-the same machines as Seth-steamrolled entire cities. He felt sick. It was all wrong. The loss of life did not concern him so much as it was the strangeness of the events. He'd been part of Shadaloo, and they had never been this powerful. The rest of the world watched as war broke out in the southeast of Asia, and talked bureaucracy as Shadaloo pressed on, virtually unopposed. Neighboring countries reinforced their borders, requesting the help of more powerful nations. But they all seemed hesitant to make a move.

He did his best not to think about it. He had enough to worry about. He spent a lot of time trying to map out all of the differences between real life and this one. If he could call his old life 'real'. This experience was beginning to make him question what he considered to be reality. Was he clinging to something that had never happened? Was he really so insane, as suggested by those pills he was supposed to be taking, that he'd been believing in a life he'd never actually lived? Or was there just some incomprehensible reason the entire world around him had changed, leaving him with memories of the way things _should _be? And was the way he knew things to be the _right _way, per se? Who was to say when there were apparently any number of possibilities? This life came with certain perks that his 'real' one hadn't, even if he wouldn't fully admit he appreciated some of them. It all became entirely too confusing to keep track of, and his notes on the matter did little to clarify anything.

He started with the oldest difference he could think of. His father hadn't left them. So his mother never married the man that would've murdered her and ruined his life. He never found a reason to go into the underground fight scene, never met Bison, never became an assassin. Similarly, Chun-Li's father never died, so the woman never became engrossed in her quest to end Shadaloo. She never paired up with Guile, and never helped destroy Bison. He'd learned that Ryu never had helped them with that either, and he was the only one to ever make it to Shadaloo and live to tell about it.

There was Cammy, too. He'd accidentally laid the foundations of self-awareness in her by informing her of her role as a clone of Bison. She began to question who she was. Her assignment to assassinate Dhalsim led to the complete erasure of the Doll programming, and Vega was supposed to kill her. He couldn't bring himself to do it, and she returned to Shadaloo to free the rest of the Dolls and destroy the psycho drive. Bison was significantly weakened by this act, and Shadaloo had never been as powerful as it had been then. But since Vega had now never met Cammy, she was still a Doll, the other twelve had never been freed, and Bison was apparently stronger than ever. That may have been a good thing for him, if he were still a part of Shadaloo. But he wasn't, and Bison wanted him dead. He found it difficult to convince himself that he could survive the threat of death from an organization powerful enough to topple entire countries.

He wasn't one for laying down and dying, though, and he'd deal with issues as they came to him. He weighed whether or not he was safer here than elsewhere. He knew Bison hunted down undesirables regardless of the extensive precautions they took. With Shadaloo stronger than ever, he supposed that fact would still hold true. If he stayed with Chun-Li, it increased his chances of survival, even if it was marginal. She could still fight, though she wasn't as impressive as before. There was also the chance that her worried father-who had contacts with government agencies-could somehow provide extra protection to them. These factors made it obvious to him that there was no good reason to try to run. There was nowhere to go, anyway.

Having wasted a significant time with all of this, he remembered the entire reason he'd gotten on the computer to begin with. That 'teaching' thing. He wrinkled his nose, really very uninterested in the work this would involve. His other self had some things prepared, but not enough to explicitly tell him how to do the work. He was poring over files on the laptop, really uninterested in everything they had to say. He had to teach a few different classes which covered drawing and painting. There were lesson plans, grading scales, lectures, supply lists, suggested readings... For every file he read, he could have sworn that three new ones were popping up in the folder like some boring digital hydra.

A little chime sound startled him, and he realized the browser was still open. The computer had been on when he woke up, and he vaguely remembered something had already been opened. He'd presumed Chun-Li must've been using it for something, and he had used a different window for delving into the news on the Dolls. The noise was unfamiliar, so he pulled up the page it had come from. Maybe he shouldn't have been looking through what she was doing, but there were a lot of thing he shouldn't have done in his life and did anyway. He figured looking through her social media accounts was the smallest offense he would ever commit against her.

She'd received a notification. That had been the chiming noise. It was from a Chinese friend, commenting on a photo she'd also commented on, and he couldn't read any of it. He shrugged. Her feed was a mix of Chinese, English, French, and even a bit of Spanish. He squinted his eyes at the little photo beside one of the Spanish names. He thought the man in the picture looked familiar. Someone he'd been in school with when he was a teenager. He clicked the account, and sure enough, the page listed him as a former student at the same school. He was now a curator at a gallery in Madrid. Vega felt a little bit of jealousy. If he remembered right, the guy was not terribly talented.

But then his own name caught his attention. The page showed himself as being a mutual friend between Chun-Li and his old classmate. He was even more curious now. In his real life, he didn't have one of these accounts, so he couldn't help but click on it. He scrolled down. He didn't put much on here, the last thing being from a bit over a week ago. It said he had been identified in a photo by her. He had to trust the site that it was actually him in the picture, because his face was totally obscured by his hair as he leaned against the window of the train they were on. "Tired doesn't begin to describe it," she'd written. Seventeen people liked that, apparently, though he couldn't fathom why. He shook his head, ready to abandon the page when he noticed something.

'See friendship.' He had to click it. If he didn't, he'd have to go back to reading those awful, boring files. And maybe, just a little, he was interested in the idea of being able to figure out how he ended up with her. He was a little surprised to see, if this page was to be believed, that they'd been together for five years. That was much too long. His longest relationship had been perhaps two weeks. He didn't make a habit of staying with the same woman for very long, and didn't believe much in commitment. He scrolled through photo after photo, updates she'd tagged him in, places they'd gone together. There they were at the Louvre. There were photos of them hiking in the mountains, people admonishing him for dangling precariously from rocks in a few of the pictures, just as Eliza had mentioned. They were thanked for all of their help at a mutual friend's wedding. They were in London. Beijing. Tokyo. New York. Had there been anywhere they hadn't visited? He felt a bit despondent when he realized how happy he looked in all of those photos. Obviously most people smiled for pictures. He knew very well that meant nothing about how happy someone actually was. He'd faked enough himself-it was just part of the game, and it didn't necessarily bother him to play it. But that was how he knew these smiles with her _weren't _forced. He looked at the way they wrote to each other. The way she gushed about him being so great, and how he'd written back an inarticulate 'ahaaa' because it flustered him so much to be cared for by someone like her.

He kept scrolling. His breath caught in his throat as he started to see people writing how truly sorry they were for the loss of his mother. He bit his tongue as he read each word, thinking back to how it had really happened and how terribly alone he'd been. How he'd avoided journalists looking for a juicy, emotional interview about the situation. How police treated him almost with impatience at how he'd been quiet and unwilling to answer questions, earning him a label of 'uncooperative'. How lawyers had treated everything in a disturbingly clinical manner, more interested in figuring out where his step-father's money was going to end up and how they could get a piece of it. How even people in his school seemed wary of talking to him anymore because something like a student who'd killed someone, even if it'd been in self-defense, spread like wildfire and the story changed every time it traded hands. Here on this page suddenly were all the words he wished he could've heard back then. "I'm so sorry for your loss." "If you ever need anything, let us know!" "We're here for you." Was that so much for somebody to ask for? Here in this world, apparently not, and he felt so intensely jealous of how things could have been. All of it, he thought suddenly. He was jealous of all of it. Jealous of knowing his real father, having at least a decent life with his mother that didn't end in abuse and murder. Meeting someone who loved him for who he was and not for being famous or having money or for the bragging rights. Not living his life one adrenaline-fueled, death-defying moment to the next because anything less was not enough to satisfy him. All at once, it seemed to hit him, and he wanted to give up on trying to get away, to just lay down and take this life as it was. Why should he fight against things that all added up to a happier life?

He looked at the page again. Saw a picture of them sitting together, her head resting on his shoulder. He hated her because she got back everything she'd lost, and he'd just treaded water. He hated her for being happy when it seemed like the same wasn't achievable for him, even if he constantly told himself he was fine. But in this reality, according to these pictures and words, he really _was _happy, so what reason was there to hate her now?

* * *

Action is coming, I promise!

response to kaptu: wow! thank you for such a long and detailed review! and are you peeking into my docs on here? lol ive written about something you mentioned here in this review for a future chapter. :) i figure that her friends know a bit about vega but have never met him, so he's sort of just 'that guy chun li is dating' until they get to know him more personally. his mother's death was natural in this version of events, and i thought it should still change him somehow, just not as significantly as snapping into a serial killer. and i'm glad people are finding ken obnoxious! i don't dislike him, but i kind of am imagining him as the sort of guy you initially are thinking he's obnoxious ,but then finding yourself enjoying his company in spite of it because he is so infectiously friendly and good-natured. he's fun to write too. thank you again for such an involved review!


	7. Chapter 7

He was on a train, trying his best to not pay attention to the woman beside him who'd sat uncomfortably close to him. Public transportation disgusted him, and he couldn't believe he hadn't thought of taking a cab until it was too late. He wasn't used to having to weigh his choices in this regard. It was crowded, someone smelled horrible, there was a pair of headphones blaring somewhere behind him, some idiot was yelling into his phone, and this _god damned woman _was inching closer, he was sure of it. This was hell, and he swore he would never come back here again. He tapped his foot, frustration mounting. He was ready to murder someone, maybe this woman who couldn't figure out where her seat ended and his started, when finally, he heard a voice announce his stop. What he hoped was his stop. Surely it was close enough to the university by now.

The air outside was cold, the wind stinging every bit of exposed skin, and he hated that too. Ice and snow lined the sidewalks, making him pay extra attention to his footing. This place was horrible, and he longed desperately for the warm beaches of Barcelona. He entertained the notion of abandoning everything to go back home, but ultimately knew he shouldn't. He kept telling himself he was safer if he stayed with Chun-Li, as backwards as that sounded, and pressed on. He wouldn't admit most of the reason for his poor mood was due to the digging around he did online the day before. It was almost sickening to see all of the changes laid out in front of him like that. He'd stuffed down all of the jealousy and other pathetic longing it'd filled him with and it came out now as relentless irritation directed at everything else.

He looked down at his phone, which showed a time of 11:30. The class he was supposed to be teaching had started fifteen minutes ago. Teaching. He almost groaned out loud. Why wasn't he just a famous artist already? Why wasn't his job hanging around at gallery openings and drinking wine and trying to out-do the most pretentious person he could find? This was a stupid decision, to teach, and he wondered if the pay was even worth it as he had no idea what a professor earned.

Houses lined the street to his right, brick storefronts and restaurants across the street to his left. Part of him thought it all looked fairly nice, but he still stubbornly hated it. A few blocks away, the belltower of a church stood, easily the tallest structure in the area. He had a vague idea that he was supposed to be heading in that direction, the church lying at the edge of the campus. Everyone around seemed to be college-aged as well, so that told him he was probably going the right way.

The university itself made him feel a bit more at home, but not by much. It clearly looked old, and though the architecture was not really Spanish in any remote way, it wouldn't have looked out of place in some European country. A lot of Chicago seemed to be red brick and steel. This was slate grey stone, somewhat gothic architecture, and dead ivy vines crawling along almost every surface. Again, he could've called it pretty if it weren't the heart of the most miserable winter he'd ever had the displeasure of experiencing.

By the time he navigated the campus and found the class he was now in charge of, it was 11:50. He felt wrong being here. He never made it to a university when he was younger, and didn't really know what was expected of him now. Classes in films always seemed to have a hundred or so people in them, but this was maybe twenty, at most, and he wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. A smaller class might mean having to talk to each of them more. Was he really ready to do this? No, but what else was he supposed to do? Maybe he could try to find a more tolerable job, but there was no leaving this one until he had something solid.

He stood at the front of the studio for a minute, unsure of what to even say to all of these kids. The oldest looked maybe twenty-one, if that. He didn't know how to talk at length with teenagers. Sure, he'd exchanged pleasantries with younger fans, but this was a lot different. When someone was doting on you, very little was expected of you. So he just cut to the chase, and asked, "What do you usually do here?" A few of them exchanged glances. He sighed, unable to keep his irritation to himself. All of his patience had been wasted on that horrible train ride.

"Uh...learn stuff?" someone finally offered.

"Thank you for the revelation that you go to school to _learn stuff_, but I meant this class, specifically," he said, coming very close to throwing something at the student.

"It's the first day," someone else said in defense of the other idiot student. "You tell us."

He glanced back at the board behind him. Nothing was on it to give some kind of hint to him. Why would it be? He was supposed to know what was going on here. Finally he shrugged and waved his hand at them. "Draw something."

"What?" someone asked.

"Just draw anything, I don't care what."

"I don't have a pencil."

"All I have is notebook paper."

"I don't have _any _paper."

He was starting to wonder if he had the authority to expel people permanently from a class, but then that would mean no longer having a class to teach. "It's a drawing class, isn't it? How did you think you were going to draw anything without a paper or pencil?" he asked.

"Most classes don't make you do work on the first day."

"Yeah, are we even going to get a syllabus or supply list?"

He thought about that for a second and remembered that folder on the computer. He probably should've had that information with him, but it was too late now. "You'll get those tomorrow."

"We don't have this class tomorrow."

"The next time you come here, then," he said. Oh, it was so hard to not throw things at them. "But this _is _a drawing class, so chances are, you'll end up drawing things. As I said before, I want you to draw something. So I can see if you should actually be here or not."

"What if we don't have anything to draw with or on?"

He shrugged. "Figure something out." He heard an irritated sigh. Maybe he wasn't making the best impression, but they were expecting entirely too much. Was he meant to bring materials for everyone? He paused. Was he? He didn't really know. He let them draw for a while, and decided this wasn't _so _bad. If he just did this every time, maybe it wouldn't be difficult to make it through the semester. After twenty minutes, he told them to stop. He walked over to the nearest student, and took their paper. Immediately, his face contorted into a look of disgust. "What is this supposed to be?"

"It's...a person..." they said, face flushing red.

"Have you ever _seen _a person? Do your eyes work? I can tell you _his _clearly don't." He tapped the paper to emphasize the malformed organs before dropping it back on the table. He took the next paper, though the student seemed reluctant. "Are those supposed to be hands? You know that bones are rigid and fairly inflexible, correct?" The third student saved him the trouble and crumpled their paper up before he got the chance to take it. If it was that bad, at least the student had some kind of self-awareness. He took the fourth paper, the student already glaring at him. "I can't do this." He dropped the paper, which looked like squiggles and lines randomly assigned to parts of the paper. Maybe if he'd squinted it could have conceivably been a tree or something, but he wasn't that generous. "Are you all this terrible? Why are you in this class? How did you make it to a university?"

"I'm dropping this class, like, today," somebody said, getting up and leaving.

"Criticism is a part of art, you realize?" he said, somewhat amused with how sensitive they were being.

"There's a difference between criticism and just being mean," someone else mumbled.

"Yeah, you're supposed to teach us how to get better."

"There are some things even I can't fix," he said, spreading his hands. He looked at his phone and shrugged. It was close enough to the end of the class, and they plainly weren't meant for this anyway. "You can all go, I suppose."

"Gladly," he heard somebody else mumble. It made him wonder where the nearest palette knife was. His next class went about roughly the same way, and he felt much more drained than he ever had from his normal, more physically demanding jobs. He'd rather fight ten bulls in a row than teach another class. He might end up less exhausted. Teaching was clearly not his strong point, and he didn't want it to be. The students from the first classes made complaints about him, and he managed to avoid a serious problem by citing the recent attempt on his life by the Shadaloo assassins. He claimed to be stressed to the point that he'd accidentally snapped at the students, and got off with a warning. Lying and making things up on the spot were some of his greatest strengths, and they were definitely useful now.

Due to all of the complaints, he had to figure out how to teach the classes in a way that wouldn't get him in trouble and also not offend his own sensibilities. He tried to channel his usual public persona in an effort to avoid further trouble or, worse, being fired, but found it didn't feel right and could be difficult to muster after the hell of his commute. He was polite, thus ridding himself of any reason to upset anyone. But if he had to be polite all of the time, he was unsure how any of these people were going to improve their work. When he realized that he didn't really _care _if they did improve or not, everything seemed to fall into place. The assignment lists his other self had drafted up were a great help, and gave him an idea of what he was supposed to be doing. Like the student in his first class had said, the first week did not consist of much real work, but a lot of talking. That would be easiest, for the students to just be quiet while he spoke. He had no problems with public speaking, though it was a bit aggravating to have to do so much of it all in a row. It didn't help that school had changed a lot since he was a teen, with every kid having a cell phone to be distracted by. Even though he wasn't passionate about making sure they learned something, he hated the idea that they weren't paying attention to him.

Thursday was his last day of teaching for the week, and that brought with it its own sense of relief. Even the fact that he still had to ride the train was not enough to dampen his mood, and that upset him in a way. He thought of office drones and other nine-to-five workers recycling the same old quips about being ready for the weekend. That wasn't him. He didn't have a schedule, a routine, a 'work week'. This completely average and mundane existence was starting to leave him feeling trapped, something that could only be fought against with something explosive, spontaneous, and exciting. Something to make him feel like he was alive and not merely existing. He thought of some of his usual exploits, but tried not to let his mind wander down that road. He didn't know this city well enough for anything like that yet. Didn't know which places tended to be ignored in the darker hours of the night, or how best to navigate them without being noticed.

He forced himself to direct his thoughts back to this unusual situation, and if it could ever be resolved. With Bison marked off of his very short list of people to ask for help, he was left with no one to go to. It felt silly in retrospect, but every time he took a shower, he squeezed his eyes shut, trying to imagine himself in his own bathroom in an attempt to will himself back to reality. Perhaps it was a testament to his desperation. It hadn't worked, and he felt embarrassed every time he tried it.

As it had been every time he'd gone outside, it was cold. A bit of cold sometimes was fine, but this, he felt, was unreasonable. The snow and wind seemed to never stop. He didn't like the way it left his hair just a bit damp, or how dry his hands felt. He didn't like having to wear a coat and gloves and a scarf all of the time. He glanced over his shoulder as he walked, looking at all the people trudging through the campus, bundled under layers of clothes. A man a few meters behind him had his scarf pulled up over his nose, and Vega decided maybe that wasn't a bad idea.

He missed his place on the upper levels of a high rise in Barcelona. He missed dangling his legs over the edge of the balcony, bare feet swaying just a little with the warm breeze. The sound of waves reaching him, the smell of the ocean. Being able to walk outside in just a pair of jeans and actually enjoy the feeling of the sun on his skin. Here he was lucky if he saw the sun at all, and he definitely wasn't going shirtless any time soon. There was some form of a 'beach' here, given that the city was positioned on the shore of Lake Michigan, but he felt that was a misleading way to describe the lake shore. Though, he supposed he may have higher standards as to what constituted a worthwhile beach.

Waiting for the train could be agonizing. It was claimed that they ran every ten to fifteen minutes, but he didn't believe it. It wasn't just that he hated public transportation and standing around with all of these awful people. It was such a waste of his time. He'd try to occupy himself by looking at his phone, but his gloves wouldn't work on the touch screen and he'd have to debate with himself whether it was worth it or not to take them off. He clenched his jaw, trying to keep his teeth from chattering. He shrugged his shoulders a few times, just for the sake of moving, and looked around at the others waiting here. One woman looked like she'd fallen asleep standing up, shoulders hunched, hands in her pockets. Two young men were engaged in a lively conversation. A guy had half his face hidden behind a scarf. A teenager was on her cell phone.

His eyes went back to the man with the scarf. Was that the same one from the university? The distinct squealing and rumbling of the train reached his ears, and everyone seemed to gravitate slowly towards the tracks. It couldn't be so unusual that he'd see someone on campus and at one of the nearest train stations. He tried not to worry over it too much. The man was further down the platform, and would end up on a different car anyway.

The train was crowded, but it was warm, and he hated that any kind of perk came with getting onto it. It pained him to be here, and he started to wonder if it would be so terrible to invest in a car. He looked at the people around him, and decided that it was an amazing idea. Rather to face the busy streets of the city than to sit in such close proximity to any of these people. His survey of the train ended abruptly when he saw the man with the scarf. So maybe it was a little strange that he'd ended up here in the same car. He tried to keep from working himself up over this guy. But it was hard not to suspect things when he knew Bison wanted him dead. He bit his tongue a little, annoyed with how paranoid this was making him. Maybe the man just wanted to sit in that specific spot. Maybe he was being watched.

The next stop was announced, and he decided there was an easy way to find a definitive answer. He left the train, walked down a few cars, and boarded again. This time, he climbed the stairs to the upper deck. Without appearing obvious, he let his eyes rove over the other passengers. He felt an ironic smile tug at his lips as he saw the man again. He hadn't looked directly at him, didn't want to give away that he'd noticed he was being followed, though he supposed getting off the train may have already done that. For a moment it seemed as if everyone's attention was on him, as if they were all in on it too and waiting for one of them to make a move. He wasn't usually the one being followed, and it was an uncomfortable position to be in, but he was certain he could handle this. Did Shadaloo have people who were as skilled in combat as he was? Sagat, he hated to admit, could crush him like a bug, and Balrog was no pushover. But that's not who he was up against. He didn't recognize the man, but he didn't exactly know the face of every infantryman and assassin in the organization. It probably wouldn't be much of a challenge. He tried to visualize the stop he'd be getting off on, planned the quickest route through it. It should be busy, full of people, which could be a problem or a blessing. They could get in his way, but he was also less likely to be outright killed in front of them. What about the route home? He tried to think. Alleys would need to be avoided, even walking by them was a risk. Was going to the apartment even a wise decision? It probably didn't matter-if the man knew where he was working, he'd know, too, where he lived. His stop was called, and he inhaled a long, measured breath as he stood up. The doors opened.

He vaulted over the railing, landing in the aisle below. He'd almost dropped on top of a guy getting out of his seat. He heard someone yell at him, but he was already bolting out of the train and out onto the grey pavement of the narrow platform. He pushed open the door to the concourse. The place struck him as looking obviously old, like something from the 30s. He didn't give himself much time to admire it now, instead glancing over his shoulder to see the man chasing him down. At least now he knew he didn't look like an idiot for running through a train station for no obvious reason. He planted a foot in the high back of one of the wooden benches, launched himself over it.

It was crowded enough in the concourse. Indignant cries and even a few curses followed as he pushed his way through, not slowing down for anything. He burst through another set of doors, nearly knocking out an angry woman on the other side. He took the stairs two at a time, almost slipping more than once on their slick surface. The wind hit him as he emerged at street level again. He couldn't take a moment to figure out where to run, and just kept going. He cut into the street, horns blaring, and one car would've taken his legs out if he hadn't reacted quickly and jumped up, sliding across the hood of the vehicle. He made it across six lanes of rush hour traffic without dying, and that felt like an accomplishment in itself. The man matched him, never seeming to hesitate or slow down, snaking through the vehicles.

He dashed through a park covered in snow. Faceless bronze and silver statues were scattered throughout like quiet sentinels. He pushed himself to move faster. Another four lanes of traffic to cross, horns blaring and people shouting. Another round of the same noises told him his pursuer wasn't far behind. He breezed past the stately facade of an art museum, nearly colliding with someone. He briefly thought of hiding out in the building, but realized it wouldn't do him any good. He'd have to come out sometime.

The cold air left his throat raw with every breath. He wondered about the guy's stamina and which one of them would tire out first. Another small park buried in snow and ice flew by on his right, leaving him at yet another intersection and he would've groaned if he had the breath to spare. That car coming in from the left wasn't going stop in time, he realized, and he let out a desperate and frustrated cry as he pushed off the slick asphalt. His foot made contact with the bumper of the vehicle without slipping as he heard their breaks squeal, and he pushed off again, narrowly missing being turned into roadkill. The momentum was almost too much when his feet hit the ground, he stumbled for a second, but ultimately managed regain balance. He heard the driver shout, something slam against a vehicle, and he glanced back over his shoulder. The man chasing him had run right into the stopped car, not giving himself enough time to stop when it did.

He didn't let that disarm him. He kept running, through yet another park and how many were there on this one damned street alone? Pedestrian traffic seemed to be picking up a bit, and he cut through the park, away from the street and sidewalk. Up a short flight of stairs, glancing back to find that he was, in fact, still being chased. But the snafu at the last intersection gave him a bigger lead now, and he'd take it. Angry calls followed after him as he weaved through a small crowd, and weren't people just terribly presumptuous? They had no idea he was running from someone who was probably going to kill him, but it didn't stop them from calling him an asshole. Throngs of people moved over the wide and open paved area at the top of the stairs, and he headed towards them. A meager amount of pale sunlight glinted off the chrome-like surface of a large sculpture, something reminiscent of a drop of liquid mercury. He kept moving towards it, hoping to get lost among the people gathered around it. Some tour group, maybe, or perhaps a school outing. Catching his breath, he disappeared into the crowd milling about beneath the sculpture, trying to remain hidden from his pursuer. He looked just between the shoulders of a pair of people trying to find their reflection overhead, and spotted the man with the scarf slowing to a walk. He was cautiously approaching the crowd, searching for his lost target. People moved, and Vega tried to move with them, always keeping someone between himself and the man. He tried to breathe evenly, not wanting to attract any attention.

The man walked slowly towards his position. He hadn't been spotted yet, he was sure, given the way the man's eyes moved slowly over the numerous faces. But if he didn't find a way to move off from the crowd, he'd be a sitting duck when they inevitably moved on to the next attraction. He crouched low. He wasn't the only one, with many people posing in all sorts of ridiculous ways in an effort to create an amusing photo with their reflection. He put one hand to the cold surface for support, trying to keep his eyes on the man. His heart stopped when he caught sight of his reflection. It was him, his real self, with his long, braided hair, dressed in the dark, standard-issue black garb of a Shadaloo assassin and the mask on his face. He drew his hand back as if he'd been burned, and almost fell. His reflection tilted its head, as if to ask what was the matter, and he could only stare back.

"Hey, are you all right, buddy?"

He breathed again, turning bewildered eyes towards the man who'd spoken. The idiot was going to get him killed. He glanced back at his reflection, and it was normal again. He had to get out of here. Without answering the stranger, he took off back towards the city, jumping over a short fence to return to street level. He wasn't expecting to land on an ice rink, and fell right onto his back. Someone shrieked, and something collided with his ribs. A heavy weight dropped onto him. He groaned as the air rushed out of his lungs. The woman who'd tripped over him was helped up by a man, and she cried,"What is wrong with you?!"

He tried to push himself back up to his feet, and found it exceedingly difficult to do so on the ice. "You can't just jump down here and knock people over," her partner said.

He ignored them, focusing more on standing upright. Walking was an excruciating trial, and he forced his way to the edge of the rink, finally finding solid ground again. Another look over his shoulder told him he hadn't been followed. He stopped to get his bearings, trying to remember which way was home from here, and to shake the image he'd seen in the side of the Cloud Gate sculpture out of his mind. He wasn't insane, he couldn't be hallucinating things. He walked towards the nearest intersection, looking for a street name. No, he'd just been stressed. Someone was chasing him down, probably to kill him, and mistaking a reflection should have been the least of his worries. He crossed the street, this time when the traffic was actually stopped. Things were easier that way. He stiffened when he felt something hard and sharp pressing against his back.

* * *

_so this chapter and the next were originally one, but it totaled out to 8000+ words, and i didn't want to do that to you guys. ;P so small cliffhanger for now._

_response to kaptu-thanks for the review, hope finals went/go well!(goes for everyone else who may be reading, too!) the sleep-talk was actually supposed to be this-reality-vega poking back in. sorry for the confusion D: and i kind of agree with your interpretation of cammy. i think the main thing to get with her is the 'not quite grown up' part, and serious about her work, certainly. i thought vega could be somewhat mystified and intrigued at the concept of a facebook-a bit of distaste towards the frivolity of it all(he's too pretentious) but it's also basically a socially acceptable form of narcissism so it's right up his alley ah ;P and i hadn't even thought about it the way you put it, creeping on himself hahaha! thanks again for the review, and do you mind if i ask, do you have an account here? no worries if you'd rather not share!_


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